The enemy within: welcome to the Internet of gaslighting
Two and a half years ago, this blog warned about the Internet of "listening, eavesdropping, spying things" that were starting to become more popular. Today, smart speakers are found in…
Many WhatsApp private groups are indexed in Google and open to the public
Many WhatsApp private groups were left exposed on the open web due to a privacy-ignoring configuration error by Facebook’s WhatsApp. The discovery was made by Jordan Wilson, a journalist for…
Freedom of speech, surveillance and privacy in the time of coronavirus
The situation concerning the Covid-19 coronavirus is serious, although it is not yet clear whether it will develop into a pandemic affecting billions of people worldwide. The story so far…
ISPs sue Maine; claim their First Amendment right to free speech allows them to sell your internet history
Internet service providers (ISPs) are taking the state of Maine to court over an internet privacy law that the ISPs do not want to follow. The lawsuit was first reported…
Private Internet Access refund policy extended to 30 days
Effective immediately, Private Internet Access subscribers will be covered under our new 30 day money back guarantee. Our subscribers are guaranteed satisfaction with our VPN product, and we wanted to…
The Indian government is reportedly cracking down on VPN usage in Jammu & Kashmir
Safwat Zargar described the situation on the ground in Jammu & Kashmir in an article on Scroll.in, highlighting that the government is taking drastic new steps to limit internet access.…
The Private Internet Access Android app is being open sourced
Private Internet Access (PIA) is open sourcing its Android VPN app and dependencies code to the public as part of its commitment to open sourcing all clients in the name…
What happens to privacy when China has personal data and the social graph of nearly everyone in the US?
The speech by US Attorney General William P. Barr hardly seems earth-shattering. But buried within its business-like announcement of the indictment of four Chinese military hackers, there is the following…
Wacom drawing tablets track the name and time everytime you open an app
Wacom drawing tablets have a dirty little secret - they are likely tracking the name and time of every app you're opening - and sending that information to Google. The…
Why the EU’s General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) risks turning into a paper tiger
Ireland's Data Protection Commission (DPC) has just announced two new GDPR inquiries. One of them concerns Tinder, as a result of "concerns raised by individuals both in Ireland and across…
The EARN IT Act is the latest clueless attack on encryption, do not fall for it
The latest attack on encryption is here, and it’s being championed under the cover of - surprise surprise - a necessary step to protect the children. Senator Lindsey Graham and…
What can we learn from the Clearview “end of privacy” story?
A couple of weeks ago, a story in the New York Times put facial recognition, and the serious problems it raises, firmly into the mainstream. It concerned the start-up Clearview…
University of Minnesota student jailed in China for tweeting memes of Chinese President Xi Jinping: How was he caught?
In 2019, a twenty year old Chinese international student from the University of Minnesota was arrested, tried, and sentenced in China for tweets he made from an anonymous account while…
The National Cyber Security Alliance’s Data Privacy Day Honeypot on StaySafeOnline.org
I was preparing to do something for Data Privacy Day on January 28th, when I discovered something truly alarming... This year and every year since 2007, Data Privacy Day is…
Top EU court’s advisor: bulk surveillance is “disproportionate”, and national security exemptions do not always apply
The Court of Justice of the European Union (CJEU), the EU's top court, has played a key role in protecting privacy in the digital age, in Europe and beyond. In…