Reuters reports: A data broker operation sold payday loan applicants’ financial information to scammers, who took in millions of dollars by debiting bank accounts and charging credit cards without authorization, the Federal Trade Commission charged Wednesday. The data brokers bought “hundreds of thousands of consumer payday loan applications” and, instead of passing them to legitimate…
Category: Govt
Federal Court: DHS Failed to Justify Withholdings in Defense Contractor Monitoring FOIA Case
From EPIC.org: In EPIC v. DHS, a federal district court ruled that the Department of Homeland Security failed to justify withholding documents subject to the Freedom of Information Act. EPIC sued DHS to compel the disclosure of records relating to a cybersecurity program designed to monitor traffic flowing through ISPs to a select number of defense contractors. The court concluded that…
Stop forcing companies to save user data, groups urge in FCC petition
David McCabe reports: A coalition of tech and privacy groups are asking the Federal Communications Commission to stop requiring that telecommunications companies store data on their customers for 18 months. Under current policies, companies have to keep “name, address, and telephone number of the caller, telephone number called, date, time and length of the call”…
Does the Government Have Carte Blanche to Retain Seized Data Indefinitely? In Amicus Brief to the Second Circuit, Policy Groups Argue No
William W. Hellmuth writes: On July 29, 2015, BakerHostetler filed an amicus brief with the Second Circuit on behalf of the Center for Democracy and Technology, joined by five prominent nonprofit public interest groups, for the en banc rehearing of United States v. Ganias, Case No. 12-240. In Ganias, the Court will grapple with arguments centering…