As gadgets and services get smarter, they need more data, and face the hard problem of keeping it safe. Data privacy has become a huge problem for Google, Facebook, Amazon, and any company using artificial intelligence to power its services — and a major sticking point for lawmakers looking to regulate. Here’s all the news on data privacy and how it’s changing tech.
Over the last year, the US Congress and state legislatures have put out bill after bill to protect kids online — some going as far as banning under 18s from using the internet at all without parental consent.
For Wednesday’s Vergecast, I spoke to legal experts, Sen. Ed Markey (D-MA), and our friend David Pierce about how many of these bills threaten the free speech and privacy of all internet users.
You don’t? Then maybe you should check to see if it still has access to your Gmail or other Google data — along with any other apps and services you may have forgotten about. Here’s how to check to see which apps, services, and extensions have permission to access your Google account, and how to disconnect them.
Elizabeth Lopatto wrote just last month that Big Tech is warning all of us about the privacy issues with AI chatbots, as companies like Samsung warn employees about giving them sensitive information that could expose trade secrets.
Now Reuters reports:
A Google privacy notice updated on June 1 also states: “Don’t include confidential or sensitive information in your Bard conversations.”
At an event in DC today, FCC Chair Jessica Rosenworcel said the new team would be updating its rules governing what cell carriers can do with customer data:
“We’re going to bring all of our technical and legal experts together from across the agency to maximize coordination and use the law to reach results by evolving our policies and taking enforcement action.”
Back in 2018, the New York Times reported that some of the US’s largest carriers — including AT&T, T-Mobile, and Verizon — were selling their customers’ real-time location data. Unfortunately and unsurprisingly, the government hasn’t really done much to stop it since then.
With the FCC still deadlocked, the task force could put the agency in a better position to approve stricter rules to prevent sim-swapping, data breaches, and the unauthorized sale of customer data if a third Democrat gets confirmed.
Strava’s heatmaps can be handy if you’re scoping out new running, cycling, and hiking routes, as it helps visualize popular areas. However, researchers discovered they could reverse-engineer where a Strava user lives — even though heatmaps are created through anonymized, aggregated data.
You can read through the findings (PDF), but essentially, the more active the user, the easier it was for researchers to find their home addresses — especially in remote areas. If that creeps you out, go to Settings > Privacy Controls > Aggregated Data Usage to opt out.
[BleepingComputer]
The internet could soon become a very different place.
Push alerts sent to LA residents via the Citizen app in 2021 offered a cash reward — that eventually reached $30,000 — with a picture of a man erroneously tabbed as an arson suspect. Hosts on Citizen’s livestream told viewers to “hunt this guy down.”
Vice has put together a two-hour documentary based on its reporting on the incident. You can see the trailer below and watch the entire documentary for free on Tubi.
And we’re not talking about text-based two-factor authentication — especially because you now have to be a paying member of Twitter Blue to use it.
Instead, if you want to keep your account safe, an authentication app is not only cheaper, but better. Here’s how to set one up for Twitter and for several other services.
It’s now been over a week since Western Digital’s My Cloud went down due to a “network security incident”, and all signs indicate that it remains dark. The good news: I’ve heard from multiple people that the Local Access workaround the company detailed on Friday does work, and has allowed some customers to access their stored files.
Representative Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez has some thoughts about the potential TikTok ban — namely that it doesn’t address the broader social media privacy concerns at hand:
I think a lot of this is putting the cart before the horse because our first priority should be in protecting your ability to exist without social media companies harvesting and commodifying every single piece of data about you.
Good Politico piece on how cops are filing ever-expanding legal requests for Ring footage and getting it — even for footage from inside people’s homes that aren’t under investigation:
The warrant included all five of his outdoor cameras, and also added a sixth camera that was inside his house, as well as any videos from cameras associated with his account, which would include the cameras in his store. It would include footage recorded from cameras he had in his living room and bedroom, as well as the 13 cameras he had installed at his store associated with his account.
Larkin, now incensed that police were requesting footage from inside his home for an investigation that didn’t even involve him, wanted to fight the warrant. He estimated that a lawyer would have been too expensive, and he only had about seven days to challenge it before Ring would comply. He still doesn’t understand how a judge could have signed off on a warrant asking for footage from a camera inside his home, when the investigation was on his neighbor.
[POLITICO]
