The US state of Maine is violating internet broadband providers’ free speech by forcing them to ask for their customers’ permission to sell their browser history, according to a new lawsuit. The case was brought this month by four telco industry groups in response to a new state-level law aimed at providing Maine residents with Read more about Forcing us to get consent before selling browser histories violates our free speech, US ISPs claim[…]

Seeking to improve its pisspoor customer service rating, UK telecoms giant Vodafone has clarified just how much information it slurps from customer networks. You might want to rename those servers, m’kay? The updates are rather extensive and were noted by customers after a headsup-type email arrived from the telco. One offending paragraph gives Vodafone an Read more about Vodafone: Yes, we slurp data on customers’ network setups, but we do it for their own good. No, you can’t opt out.[…]

You probably don’t realize just how many devices in your home or workplace are not only capable of eavesdropping on all your conversations but are specifically designed to. Smartphones, tablets, computers, smartwatches, smart speakers, even voice-activated appliances that have access to smart assistants like Amazon’s Alexa or Google Assistant feature built-in microphones that are constantly Read more about This Bracelet Prevents Smart Speakers From Spying on You[…]

The popular Edison email app, which is in the top 100 productivity apps on the Apple app store, scrapes users’ email inboxes and sells products based off that information to clients in the finance, travel, and e-Commerce sectors. The contents of Edison users’ inboxes are of particular interest to companies who can buy the data Read more about How Big Companies Spy on Your Emails[…]

Based on the findings, more than 20 consumer and civil society organisations in Europe and from different parts of the world are urging their authorities to investigate the practices of the online advertising industry. The report uncovers how every time we use apps, hundreds of shadowy entities are receiving personal data about our interests, habits, Read more about The advertising industry is systematically breaking the law says Norweigan consumer council[…]

On Tuesday, the Czech data protection authority announced an investigation into antivirus company Avast, which was harvesting the browsing history of over 100 million users and then selling products based on that data to a slew of different companies including Google, Microsoft, and Home Depot. The move comes after a joint Motherboard and PCMag investigation Read more about Data Protection Authority Investigates Avast for Selling Users’ Browsing and Maps History[…]

When you visit any website, its owner will know where you click, what you type, and how you move your mouse. That’s how websites work: In order to perform actions based on user input, they have to know what that input is. On its own, that information isn’t all that useful, but many websites today Read more about Almost Every Website You Visit Records Exactly How Your Mouse Moves[…]

The American Civil Liberties Union plans to fight newly revealed practices by the Department of Homeland Security which used commercially available cell phone location data to track suspected illegal immigrants. “DHS should not be accessing our location information without a warrant, regardless whether they obtain it by paying or for free. The failure to get Read more about US gov buys all US cell phone location data, wants to use it for deportations[…]

In a perfect world, every new computer with Windows 10 on it—or every new installation of Windows 10—would arrive free of annoying applications and other bloatware that few people need. (Sorry, Candy Crush Saga.) It would also be free of annoying advertising. While that’s not to say that Microsoft is dropping big banners for Coke Read more about How to Remove Windows 10’s Annoying Ads Masquerading as ‘Suggestions’[…]

Wacom’s official tablet drivers leak to the manufacturer the names of every application opened, and when, on the computers they are connected to. Software engineer Robert Heaton made this discovery after noticing his drawing board’s fine-print included a privacy policy that gave Wacom permission to, effectively, snoop on him. Looking deeper, he found that the Read more about Wacom tablet drivers phone home with names, times of every app opened on your computer[…]

In a new privacy-related fuckup, Google told users today that it might’ve accidentally imported your personal photos into another Google user’s account. Whoopsie! First flagged by Duo Security CTO Jon Oberheide, Google seems to be emailing users who plugged into the company’s native Takeout app to backup their videos, warning that a bug resulted in Read more about Google’s Takeout App Leaked Videos To Unrelated Users[…]

Dasha Metropolitansky and Kian Attari, two students at the Harvard John A. Paulson School of Engineering and Applied Sciences, recently built a tool that combs through vast troves of consumer datasets exposed from breaches for a class paper they’ve yet to publish. “The program takes in a list of personally identifiable information, such as a Read more about Researchers Find ‘Anonymized’ Data Is Even Less Anonymous Than We Thought[…]

There is now a special page in the Firefox browser where users can see what telemetry data Mozilla is collecting from their browser. Accessible by typing about:telemetry in the browser’s URL address bar, this new section is a recent addition to Firefox. The page shows deeply technical information about browser settings, installed add-ons, OS/hardware information, Read more about Firefox now shows what telemetry data it’s collecting about you (if any)[…]

When it comes to ways to learn about your DNA, Promethease’s service seemed like one of the safest. They promised anonymity, and to delete your report after 45 days. But now that MyHeritage has bought the company, users are being notified that their DNA data is now on MyHeritage. Wait, what? It turns out that Read more about Don’t use online DNA tests! If You Ever Used Promethease, Your DNA Data Might Be on MyHeritage – and so will your family’s[…]

A very questionable facial recognition tool being offered to law enforcement was recently exposed by Kashmir Hill for the New York Times. Clearview — created by a developer previously best known for an app that let people put Trump’s “hair” on their own photos — is being pitched to law enforcement agencies as a better Read more about Social media scrapers Clearview Lied About Its Crime-Solving Power In Pitches To Law Enforcement Agencies[…]

At the USENIX Enigma conference on Tuesday, representatives of four browser makers, Brave, Google, Microsoft, and Mozilla, gathered to banter about their respective approaches to online privacy, while urging people not to ask for too much of it. Apple, which has advanced browser privacy standards but was recently informed that its tracking defenses can be Read more about Brave, Google, Microsoft, Mozilla gather together to talk web privacy… and why we all shouldn’t get too much of it. Only FF and Brave will give you some.[…]

Ubiquiti Networks is once again under fire for suddenly rewriting its telemetry policy after changing how its UniFi routers collect data without telling anyone. The changes were identified in a new help document published on the US manufacturer’s website. The document differentiates between “personal data”, which includes everything that identifies a specific individual, and “other Read more about Ubiquiti says UniFi routers will beam performance data back to mothership without consent automatically, no opt-out.[…]

In a blog post earlier today, the famously privacy-conscious Mark Zuckerberg announced that—in honor of Data Privacy Day, which is apparently a thing—the official rollout of a long-awaited Off-Facebook Activity tool that allows Facebook users to monitor and manage the connections between Facebook profiles and their off-platform activity. “To help shed more light on these Read more about Facebook Enables Confusing ‘Off-Facebook Activity’ Privacy Tool, which won’t stop any tracking whatsoever[…]

An investigation by EFF of the Ring doorbell app for Android found it to be packed with third-party trackers sending out a plethora of customers’ personally identifiable information (PII). Four main analytics and marketing companies were discovered to be receiving information such as the names, private IP addresses, mobile network carriers, persistent identifiers, and sensor Read more about Ring Doorbell App Gives Away your data to 3rd parties, without your knowledge or consent[…]

A lawsuit — seeking class-action status — was filed this week in Illinois against Clearview AI, a New York-based startup that has scraped social media networks for people’s photos and created one of the biggest facial recognition databases in the world. The secretive startup was exposed last week in an explosive New York Times report Read more about Class-action lawsuit filed against creepy Clearview AI startup which scraped everyones social media profiles[…]

The dystopian nightmare begins. Today, London’s Metropolitan Police Service announced it will begin deploying Live Facial Recognition (LFR) tech across the capital in the hopes of locating and arresting wanted peoples. […] The way the system is supposed to work, according to the Metropolitan Police, is the LFR cameras will first be installed in areas Read more about London Police Will Start Using Live Facial Recognition Tech Now, Big Brother becomes a computer watching you[…]