In a letter (pdf) to members of the House of Representatives, 36 groups (including the American Civil Liberties Union, American Library Association, Center for National Security Studies, Electronic Frontier Foundation, Government Accountability Project, and the Republican Liberty Caucus) urged them to vote “No” to H.R. 3523, the “Cyber Intelligence Sharing and Protection Act of 2011 (CISPA).” The legislation is scheduled [...]
The Wall Street Journal takes a look at the new kinds of security technology that’s being used by celebrities and other homeowners with the money to buy them. The systems include facial-recognition technology, cameras, sensors and other types of devices that can protect individuals’ privacy: Fueled by homeowners’ increasing demands for privacy and security, a [...]
Jennifer Stoddart, the Privacy Commissioner of Canada, announced in a news release the findings of three complaint investigations against social-networking site Facebook. Facebook has shown greater awareness of users privacy rights, but still needs to do a better job of considering privacy issues before rolling out new features, Privacy Commissioner of Canada (OPC) Jennifer Stoddart [...]
The Office of the Privacy Commissioner of Canada would like to extend tremendous thanks to all of the students, teachers and schools who participated in our myprivacy & me national video contest this year. We would also like to express sincere thanks to Encounters with Canada, and the teens participating in its Politics in Canada [...]
Slate considers advances in eye-tracking technology that allow cameras to capture the movement of our eyes and gather data about what we might be thinking — and how this could affect individual privacy: Consider, for a moment, the following list: Republican. Abortion. Democrat. Future. Afghanistan. Health care. Same-sex marriage. There is an enormous amount of [...]
A recently released study has given further evidence to the link between privacy and personal information protection and consumer confidence. The Edelman study released in February 2012 shows that consumer concerns about data privacy and security are actively diminishing their trust in organizations. For instance, 92% listed data security and privacy as important considerations for [...]
The Associated Press reports on the use of tracking technology to keep tabs on students in Brazil: Grade-school students in a northeastern Brazilian city are using uniforms embedded with locator chips that help alert parents if they’re cutting classes, the city’s education secretary said Thursday. Twenty thousand students in 25 of Vitoria da Conquista’s 213 [...]
There has been considerable controversy about mobile applications’ downloading users’ personal data after it was revealed that photo-sharing mobile application Path uploaded users’ entire address books without permission, and there was substantial public criticism of the company’s actions. Then it was revealed that both Apple’s iOS mobile devices (iPhone, iPod, iPad) and Google’s Android mobile devices allowed apps to access users’ [...]
Last month, the Wall Street Journal reported on new research by Stanford researcher Jonathan Mayer that shows four companies seek to circumvent consumers’ privacy settings in Apple’s browser, Safari. The four companies are: Google, Vibrant Media, Media Innovation Group and PointRoll. Google said the circumvention was a mistake and it has disabled the code, but there was intense public criticism. Congressmen [...]