From EFF: The Sacramento Municipal Utility District (SMUD) searches entire zip codes’ worth of people’s private data and discloses it to police without a warrant or any suspicion of wrongdoing, according to a privacy lawsuit filed Wednesday in Sacramento County Superior Court. SMUD’s bulk disclosure of customer utility data turns its entire customer base into potential leads…
Category: Govt
A Person’s “Ideologies And Contextual Behaviors” Could Classify Them As A Violent Extremist
Joe Cadillic writes: A recent DHS/FBI/NCTC “U.S. Violent Extremist Mobilization Indicators” booklet warns law enforcement that violent domestic extremists are just biding their time to attack them and our democracy. The first sentence in the extremist indicator booklet claims that the U.S. and ‘other Western nations’ face a heightened threat of violent extremists but never backs up…
Feds want drunk-driving detectors on all new cars after California crash that killed 9
Richard Winton reports: An investigation into a New Year’s Day crash in Avenal, Calif., in 2021 that killed nine people — including seven children — has prompted the National Transportation Safety Board to call for an alcohol-impairment detection system to be installed in all new cars. The NTSB, which investigates the most severe traffic collisions along with other transit disasters,…
Customs officials have copied Americans’ phone data at massive scale
Drew Harwell reports: U.S. government officials are adding data from as many as 10,000 electronic devices each year to a massive database they’ve compiled from cellphones, iPads and computers seized from travelers at the country’s airports, seaports and border crossings, leaders of Customs and Border Protection told congressional staff in a briefing this summer. The…