When you walk into a brick and mortar retail store like a Nordstrom, Cabela, or even Family Dollar, you’re being tracked around the store. Not by an over-suspicious security guard, but by the store’s wireless network, using your phone’s Wi-Fi. The store then uses your phone to track you around the store, determine if you’re a repeat visitor, see what departments you visit, and more. Here’s how they do it, and how to stop them.
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Skype has long claimed to be "end-to-end encrypted", an architectural category that suggests conversations over the service would be difficult or impossible to eavesdrop upon, even given control of users’ Internet connections. But Skype’s 2005 independent security review admits a caveat to this protection: "defeat of the security mechanisms at the Skype Central Server" could facilitate a "man-in-the-middle attack" (see section 3.4.1). Essentially, the Skype service plays the role of a certificate authority for its users and, like other certificate authorities, could facilitate eavesdropping by giving out the wrong keys.
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Imagine a world where your debit card stays in your pocket at all times, and you never have to touch cash. This is a place where you don’t have to remember your wallet, or even phone, when you run down to the corner store. It’s a future well off in the distance, to be sure, but dozens of companies are taking the first steps to get there.
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Just a few days after Google and Twitter pushed for the government to reveal the number of security-related requests, the Obama administration and Congress have just received another salvo backed by even more tech heavyweights — 63, to be exact. A letter signed by many of the giants covered by PRISM — including Apple, Facebook and Google, among other major companies — requests greater transparency in data requests, and demands permission to publish regular reports indicating what information is collected. In addition to pushing for greater transparency among companies, the memo urges Congress to enact similar requirements for the US government. The letter adds:
This information about how and how often the government is using these legal authorities is important to the American people, who are entitled to have an informed public debate about the appropriateness of those authorities and their use, and to international users of US-based service providers who are concerned about the privacy and security of their communications.
Those words were backed by several non-profit groups such as the Wikimedia Foundation in addition to a long roster of companies and investors, making this letter one of the loudest responses to the NSA’s data-collecting program to date. Click through to read the full text.
Filed under: Internet, Apple, Google, Facebook
Via: The Next Web
With the recent fiasco with the NSA and PRISM program, concern for user privacy has skyrocketed tremendously, and now that the word is out on tech companies, they have no choice but to make things better for their users. Google is doing its part, and it’s said that the search giant is secretly testing encryption methods for Google Drive files for protection against the NSA.
According to CNET, sources say that Google is experimenting with encrypting Google Drive files in order to prevent the NSA and other government agencies from digging into users’ files. While a small number of files are already encrypted, it seems Google wants to encrypt every file that goes through its Google Drive servers.
PRISM collects data that the companies are required to provide under the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act. However, encrypted files don’t fall under FISA (as long as the government doesn’t know the password to get in), so it seems that companies are heading in this direction with their user files, Google Drive being one of the first cloud services to begin the process.
Of course, companies use HTTPS as a form of encryption in order to protect the communications of files while they’re being transmitted over the interwebs, but cloud companies rarely encrypt files that are simply just sitting there in the cloud. This is mainly because it’s a complex thing to do and it ups the cost of server computing power.
However, in a time where users are becoming more and more wary of tech companies and the data they have on users, these companies can’t become stingy, and they need to start taking action to protect users’ files and information, even if that means going out of their way to include encryption and other security benefits.
SOURCE: CNET
Google Drive encryption tipped incoming for NSA protection is written by Craig Lloyd & originally posted on SlashGear.
© 2005 – 2013, SlashGear. All right reserved.
In the past several weeks, EFF has received many requests for advice about privacy tools that provide technological shields against mass surveillance. We’ve been interested for many years in software tools that help people protect their own privacy; we’ve defended your right to develop and use cryptographic software, we’ve supported the development of the Tor software, and written privacy software of our own. This article looks at some of the available tools to blunt the effects of mass surveillance.
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CNET has learned that Google may be implementing measures to keep the government (or anyone else) out of your Google Drive-stored data. Should this be true, folks concerned about their privacy — everyone, we would hope — might rest easier in a post-PRISM world. According to one of CNET‘s anonymous sources, this isn’t some flight of fancy, either: A small percentage of Drive files are already protected. Of course, even such digital protection is not guaranteed to keep your files private, but it would force those who would like a peek to obtain your login credentials first. Not that Uncle Sam would ever do such a thing without legal permission, right?
Source: CNET
Apple, Google, Facebook, Microsoft, Twitter and others are forming an alliance to demand more transparency from the NSA. According to AllThingsD, they’ll ask President Obama to let them do three things in their transparency reports and ask the government to provide their own transparency reports too.
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Jay-Z’s Magna Carta album release with a Samsung-centric app has lit the flame for some rather simple privacy invasion concerns. While many apps request the data this media-touting title does, the scale of this release found itself the subject of chatter from officials at U.S. civil liberties group the Electronic Privacy Information Centre (EPIC). This week Samsung fires back.
Samsung has made clear that they’ve had no intention of selling the information the app collects, nor do they use said information for malicious – or unwarranted – purposes. What information, you might ask? According to EPIC, no less than “massive amounts of personal information… including location data” which they’d then use for “hidden spam techniques.”
This app, they say, promotes itself with these hidden spam techniques to users the initial user is connected to without the knowledge of the user. Of course if you’ve used the app yourself, you’ll know what they’re talking about: sharing through Facebook and Twitter.
“We are aware of the complaint… and believe it is baseless. Samsung takes customer privacy and the protection of personal information very seriously.
Any information obtained through the application download process was purely for customer verification purposes, app functionality purposes and for marketing communications, but only if the customer requests to receive those marketing communications.
Samsung is in no way inappropriately using or selling any information obtained from users through the download process.” – Samsung Representative
If you wanted to see a set of lyrics from one of the Magna Carta Holy Grail songs before the launch of the album, the app required you to share the fact that you were doing so with Facebook or Twitter. At this point in time, sharing is not only still voluntary – it’s relatively hard to do. You can read the full app Privacy Policy for more information if you do so wish.
VIA: Express
Samsung calls Jay-Z app privacy jabs “baseless” is written by Chris Burns & originally posted on SlashGear.
© 2005 – 2013, SlashGear. All right reserved.
“What do you do with it in the men’s room?” That’s the number one question I get about Google Glass, the face-mounted wearable computer from Google.
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This is site is run by Sascha Endlicher, M.A., during ungodly late night hours. Wanna know more about him? Connect via Social Media by jumping to about.me/sascha.endlicher.
