Back in June, 2015, I posted a link to an article on “surveillance capitalism.” Did you take note at the time? This week, Rex Lee reports: Today, people, businesses, government officials, and law makers are unaware of the business model that supports their favorite technology such as smartphones and connected products that are supported by the Android,…
Category: Featured News
‘Do Not Track,’ the Privacy Tool Used by Millions of People, Doesn’t Do Anything
Kashmir Hill reports: When you go into the privacy settings on your browser, there’s a little option there to turn on the “Do Not Track” function, which will send an invisible request on your behalf to all the websites you visit telling them not to track you. A reasonable person might think that enabling it…
Smart Home Surveillance: Governments Tell Google’s Nest To Hand Over Data 300 Times
Thomas Brewster reports: Anyone pumped for this week’s launch of Google’s Home Hub might want to temper their excitement. A smart home is a surveilled home. That’s been the concern of privacy activists since citizens started lighting up their abodes with so-called “smart” tech in recent years. Take Google’s current smart home division, Nest Labs. It’s been…
Facebook Says Russian Firms ‘Scraped’ Data, Some for Facial Recognition
Jack Nicas reports: On the same day Facebook announced that it had carried out its biggest purge yet of American accounts peddling disinformation, the company quietly made another revelation: It had removed 66 accounts, pages and apps linked to Russian firms that build facial recognition software for the Russian government. Facebook said Thursday that it…