Archive for the 'Surveillance' Category
Google Has Quietly Dropped Ban on Personally Identifiable Web Tracking
October 21st, 2016Via: ProPublica: When Google bought the advertising network DoubleClick in 2007, Google founder Sergey Brin said that privacy would be the company’s “number one priority when we contemplate new kinds of advertising products.” And, for nearly a decade, Google did in fact keep DoubleClick’s massive database of web-browsing records separate by default from the names […]
NSA Contractor’s Alleged Theft ‘Breathtaking’ in Scope
October 20th, 2016Via: Baltimore Sun: The alleged theft of classified documents by a former NSA contractor from Glen Burnie was “breathtaking” in its scope, federal authorities said in a court filing Thursday, including information produced over two decades that detailed some of the country’s most sensitive intelligence operations. … Authorities seized some 50,000 gigabytes of digital information […]
All Tesla Cars Being Produced Now Have Hardware Capable of Level 4 Autonomy
October 19th, 2016A validation period of unspecified length will be required before the fully autonomous features become available. Here’s a sentence in the press release that’s worth noting: Before activating the features enabled by the new hardware, we will further calibrate the system using millions of miles of real-world driving to ensure significant improvements to safety and […]
UK Security Agencies Unlawfully Collected Data for 17 Years, Court Rules
October 18th, 2016Via: Guardian: British security agencies have secretly and unlawfully collected massive volumes of confidential personal data, including financial information, on citizens for more than a decade, senior judges have ruled. The investigatory powers tribunal, which is the only court that hears complaints against MI5, MI6 and GCHQ, said the security services operated an illegal regime […]
Feds Walk Into A Building, Demand Everyone’s Fingerprints To Open Phones
October 18th, 2016Via: Forbes: In what’s believed to be an unprecedented attempt to bypass the security of Apple iPhones, or any smartphone that uses fingerprints to unlock, California’s top cops asked to enter a residence and force anyone inside to use their biometric information to open their mobile devices. FORBES found a court filing, dated May 9 2016, in which the Department of Justice sought […]
Half of American Adults Already In Facial Recognition Network
October 18th, 2016Via: Vocativ: Half of all American adults are already in some sort of facial recognition network accessible to law enforcement, according to a comprehensive new study. Conducted over a year and relying in part on Freedom of Information and public record requests to 106 law enforcement agencies, the study, conducted by Georgetown Law’s Center on […]
U.S. Based VPN Tries to Get Me to Promote Their Service
October 7th, 2016As I’ve told you guys on here forever, all a VPN does is shift your Internet activity from one place to another. Instead of the logs being held by X, they’re held by Y. It’s not magic. You’re not anonymous online. Since I can’t know what any VPN service is doing on the backend, I’ll […]
National Guard, State Police Descend on 81-Year-Old’s Property to Seize Single Pot Plant
October 6th, 2016Via: Daily Hampshire Gazette: All that remains of the solitary marijuana plant an 81-year-old grandmother had been growing behind her South Amherst home is a stump and a ragged hole in the ground. Margaret Holcomb said she was growing the plant as medicine, a way to ease arthritis and glaucoma and help her sleep at […]
FBI Arrests NSA Contractor
October 5th, 2016Via: The Atlantic: The FBI arrested a National Security Agency contractor in late August for stealing classified material from the intelligence organization, according to court documents unsealed Wednesday. Federal prosecutors have charged Harold Thomas Martin III, 51, of Glen Burnie, Maryland, with theft of government property and unauthorized removal and retention of classified materials. Martin […]
Not OK, Google
October 5th, 2016Via: Tech Crunch: At its hardware launch event in San Francisco yesterday, Alphabet showed the sweeping breadth of its ambition to own consumers’ personal data, as computing continues to accelerate away from static desktops and screens, coalescing into a cloud of connected devices with the potential to generate far more data — and data of […]
