Displaying items by tag: Privacy

What do Apple, Microsoft (Including Skype), Google (YouTube), Facebook, Yahoo, and PalTalk have in common? Well they all participate knowingly in one rather invasive program run by the NSA under the guise of National Security. The program called PRISM was started in 2007 in the last moths of the George W. Bush’s administration the program creates a cooperative system with the listed companies to allow the NSA to query systems for information. Ostensibly the program is intended to protect the US from foreign threats including terrorism, but it has such a wide license that it has already been shown to have captured data about US citizens. To make matters worse certain members of Congress knew about the project back in 2007 and even granted the DOJ the power to force companies to comply in 2008.

If Microsoft is thinking that the Xbox One is just going to fly off the shelves and take over our living rooms they might have a nasty surprise in store for them. Despite the many positive features and aspects of the Xbox One there are some concerns (and complaints) from gamers, consumers, and now even privacy groups.

About a month ago a memo was “leaked’ by the DEA to CNET that started a storm of articles about how secure some online messaging systems were. The memo appeared to indicate the Apple’s iMessage service was so secure that it could not be broken by government agents. They claimed that they were not able to get message details or information. Sadly, the memo ended up making the DEA look incompetent and showed that it was just an attempt to sway public opinion on the need for more surveillance powers for law enforcement.

The Google Glass project has caused some concern in Washington. They seem to feel that a device that can capture still images and movies which you wear around all the time could be a problem. Already we have seen casinos ban them, which is not surprising as they could be used to cheat the house. Next to ban Google Glass were the strip clubs, again not a big surprise and you can imagine why. Google Glass could be a problem and we can see businesses, schools and other place banning their use in the very near future. Still we wonder about Congress getting involved. Is their concern really about privacy?

“Between the mind that plans and the hands that build there must be a Mediator and this must be the heart.” – Metropolis, 1927 - Universum

Governments around the globe are working hard to develop guidelines and laws that will ensure the protection of your data, your information and you. That has to make you feel about as safe as someone coming to your door and saying, “I’m from the tax service and here to help you.” Actually, their work doesn’t make me feel good or concerned. My information – and yours – is already out there. And we all keep adding to it voluntarily for them.

It looks like the US wants to export something new to the world, now we are not talking about a technology. We are talking about our draconian copyright laws. You remember those nasty laws that the entertainment industry and software companies keep extending and expanding. For years our government has tried to be the police for these groups with laws like SOPA, PIPA Cyber Intelligence Sharing and Protection act and more. Well they are trying to force other countries to adopt these same rules and using trade agreements to do it. They have already been stopped once with ACTA (Anti-Counterfeiting Trade Agreement) when they tried to remove the rights of individual countries to establish their own laws and are at it again with the Trans Pacific Partnership.

The FBI and a few other groups would like to put a law in place which would allow them to fine companies that refuse to hand over information regardless of the reasons for not choosing to do so. This plan is part of an increasing effort to force companies to share user information with the government. On the surface the idea looks pretty straight forward. Law Enforcement and other Government Agencies want to be able to track down people that might be using the internet and internet communication services to commit crimes. Sounds legit right?

Remember Path? You know them, the social community that was accused of abusing access to their members’ mobile address books? Well they are at it again. The problem popped up not that long after they got into trouble for collecting information illegally including personal information about minors. They were reprimanded and fined $800,000 (which to a large business is still not that much). You would think they would have learned their lesson about this. Sadly it still seems to be an issue and Path argues that it this is all about maintaining the user experience.

Microsoft has embarked on a campaign claiming that they are concerned about your privacy on the internet. The campaign is a direct attack at Google who does not have the best track record when it comes to protecting people’s privacy. In fact Google is currently under investigation for establishing policies that violate EU privacy laws. Microsoft is taking advantage of commotion around Google’s privacy problems to try and bring people over to their side. This move, when looked at is as interesting as it is funny.

As we wrote earlier today the Cyber Intelligence Sharing and Protection Act has passed through the US House of Representatives. This is not an act that anyone, other than the corporations that lobbied for it, wants. CISPA brings nothing to the table that agencies already do not have, or cannot get with the right requests to the courts. Instead it removes many (almost all) individual rights and turns your private data into a commodity that can be passed around without any legal recourse.