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Category Archives: E-Records

How Long to Keep Every Important Financial Document

Lifehacker – Avoid identity theft and legal nightmares through proper document retention and destruction. Properly storing, saving, and disposing of financial documents isn’t just a good way to cut down on clutter and save yourself from potentially nightmarish paper-chases when The Man calls. It also makes it harder for anyone to steal your identity. How… Continue Reading

Firefox rolls out Total Cookie Protection by default to more users worldwide

Mozilla Blog: “Take back your privacy – Firefox is rolling out Total Cookie Protection by default to more Firefox users worldwide, making Firefox the most private and secure major browser available across Windows, Mac, Linux and Android. Total Cookie Protection is Firefox’s strongest privacy protection to date, confining cookies to the site where they were… Continue Reading

FBI Warns Against Using Public USB Ports Due to Malware Risk

MacRumors: “The United States Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) last week warned users to stay away from public USB ports due to malware risks. On Twitter, the Denver FBI office (via CNBC) said that public charging stations in hotels, airports, and shopping centers can be a malware attack vector. Bad actors have learned to use… Continue Reading

Facial recognition is helping Putin curb dissent with the aid of US tech

“…​​It’s no secret that the Russian government uses facial recognition to keep an eye on citizens. In 2017, the city of Moscow announced the launch of one of the world’s largest facial recognition video surveillance networks. In a news release at the time, Moscow’s Department of Information Technologies said 160,000 cameras across the city –… Continue Reading

Top browsers for privacy (and why you should hide your online activity)

ZDNET: “Web browsers have become flooded with ad-sponsored content, making browsers a key battleground for end-user privacy. While Chrome is the most widely-used browser in the world, there are also alternative browsers and ways to improve your security, while staying anonymous online. Data is one of today’s key ingredients for generating revenue. Online advertising companies… Continue Reading

Clearview AI scraped 30 billion images from Facebook and gave them to cops

Insider: it puts everyone into a ‘perpetual police line-up’ – ” Clearview AI scraped 30 billion photos from Facebook to build its facial recognition database. US police have used the database nearly a million times, the company’s CEO told the BBC. One digital rights advocate told Insider the company is “a total affront to peoples’… Continue Reading

Coalition Urge FCC to Provide All Consumers With Robust Protection From Data Breaches

“Last week, EPIC, along with the Center for Democracy and Technology, Privacy Rights Clearinghouse, and Public Knowledge, jointly filed reply comments with the Federal Communications Commission urging the agency to prioritize protecting consumers from data breaches by explicitly naming and outlining its multiple sources of legal authority to protect privacy. As the comments explain, this… Continue Reading

Executive Order on Prohibition on Use by the United States Government of Commercial Spyware that Poses Risks to National Security

March 27, 2023 – “By the authority vested in me as President by the Constitution and the laws of the United States of America, it is hereby ordered as follows:  Section 1.  Policy.  Technology is central to the future of our national security, economy, and democracy.  The United States has fundamental national security and foreign… Continue Reading

The Nightmare of AI-Powered Gmail Has Arrived

New York Mag – The Intelligencer: “With the release of tools like DALL-E and ChatGPT, Google — once the presumptive industry leader in artificial-intelligence research — suddenly finds itself playing catch-up. The rise of OpenAI was reportedly a “code red” emergency at the company, which had quietly been working on, but not really releasing, similar… Continue Reading

North Korean hackers using Chrome extensions to steal Gmail emails

Bleeping Computer: “A joint cybersecurity advisory from the German Federal Office for the Protection of the Constitution (BfV) and the National Intelligence Service of the Republic of Korea (NIS) warn about Kimsuky’s use of Chrome extensions to steal target’s Gmail emails. Kimsuky (aka Thallium, Velvet Chollima) is a North Korean threat group that uses spear… Continue Reading

TSA confirms plans to mandate mug shots for domestic air travel

Papers Please: “In an on-stage interview [March 14, 2023] at South By Southwest by a reporter for the Dallas Morning News, the head of the US Transportation Security Administration made explicit that the TSA plans to make collection of biometric data mandatory for airline travel: According to a report in [March 15, 2023] of the… Continue Reading