Tag: gdpr
  • Jul 6, 2021 |
  • Glyn Moody |
  • General Privacy News, Governments, Social Media, Surveillance,

Multiple European Attempts to Strengthen Online Privacy Are Likely to Have Global Impact

Often it can seem that the battle to protect online privacy is hopeless, as companies gather ever-more data about us as we move around the internet. But in the background, the fightback is underway. It’s happening on multiple fronts, and it’s happening slowly, but it is definitely happening. For example, back in 2017, Privacy News … Continue reading “Multiple European Attempts to Strengthen Online Privacy Are Likely to Have Global Impact”

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  • Jun 8, 2021 |
  • Glyn Moody |
  • General Privacy News, Governments, Social Media,

Antitrust investigations on both sides of the Atlantic emerge as an important new way of protecting privacy

A few weeks ago, Privacy News Online wrote about the Hamburg Commissioner for Data Protection and Freedom of Information taking action against Facebook, in a move that signalled growing unhappiness with how the GDPR is being enforced. Two years ago, there was another move in Germany against Facebook, by Germany’s competition authority, the Bundeskartellamt, that … Continue reading “Antitrust investigations on both sides of the Atlantic emerge as an important new way of protecting privacy”

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  • Jun 1, 2021 |
  • Glyn Moody |
  • General Privacy News, Governments, Social Media, Surveillance,

Major fightbacks against “cookie banner terror” and facial image scraping launched across Europe by privacy activists

The EU’s main privacy law, the General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) is three years old. Access Now has produced what it calls an “implementation report”, which usefully summarizes the GDPR’s achievements and problems. One of the latter is the lack of enforcement by the Irish Data Protection Commission. Another is the continuing use by Web … Continue reading “Major fightbacks against “cookie banner terror” and facial image scraping launched across Europe by privacy activists”

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  • May 20, 2021 |
  • Glyn Moody |
  • General Privacy News, Governments, Social Media, Surveillance,

Better than the EU’s GDPR? China’s new privacy law includes a rule for handling personal information after death

Back in January, Privacy News Online wrote about China’s important new privacy legislation, the Personal Information Protection Law. That post concentrated on the law’s extraterritorial reach, and its likely impact on non-Chinese companies, and referred to the first draft of the law. The second version has just been released, and an article on the Protocol … Continue reading “Better than the EU’s GDPR? China’s new privacy law includes a rule for handling personal information after death”

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  • May 18, 2021 |
  • Glyn Moody |
  • General Privacy News, Governments, Social Media, Surveillance,

Bad news for Facebook on two fronts – and for Ireland’s role as EU’s privacy enforcer

Back in February, Privacy News Online wrote about a major change to the way WhatsApp and Facebook accounts would be managed. New terms and conditions for WhatsApp users meant that the service is granting itself the right to share users’ data with other Facebook companies. Since Facebook’s privacy policy also allows a more general cross-company … Continue reading “Bad news for Facebook on two fronts – and for Ireland’s role as EU’s privacy enforcer”

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  • May 11, 2021 |
  • Glyn Moody |
  • Encryption, General Privacy News, Governments, Social Media, Surveillance,

Privacy concerns cause tensions over data localization and data transfers to rise

A recurrent theme on this blog has been the growing importance of controlling cross-border data flows, in part because of concerns about privacy. One increasingly popular approach with governments is to require data localization, whereby a country’s personal data remains within its borders. Although some companies like Facebook have been fighting this tendency, others providing … Continue reading “Privacy concerns cause tensions over data localization and data transfers to rise”

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  • May 7, 2021 |
  • Glyn Moody |
  • General Privacy News, Governments,

McKinsey & Company agrees that the time is up for the current model of online advertising: here’s what it thinks comes next

Highly-paid management consultants are generally regarded with a certain suspicion and perhaps envy by many people. A popular joke has it that a management consultant is someone who borrows your watch to tell you the time, and then keeps your watch. Whatever your views on management consultants, there is no denying their influence on businesses. … Continue reading “McKinsey & Company agrees that the time is up for the current model of online advertising: here’s what it thinks comes next”

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  • Apr 27, 2021 |
  • Glyn Moody |
  • General Privacy News, Governments, Social Media, Surveillance,

EU unveils proposals for wide-ranging AI regulation with a global reach, and facial recognition systems flagged up as “high risk”

The European Commission has unveiled proposals for what it terms “new rules and actions aiming to turn Europe into the global hub for trustworthy Artificial Intelligence”. Evidently hoping that the new regulation will set standards for AI as the GDPR set them for privacy, the Commission says: “With these landmark rules, the EU is spearheading … Continue reading “EU unveils proposals for wide-ranging AI regulation with a global reach, and facial recognition systems flagged up as “high risk””

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  • Apr 20, 2021 |
  • Glyn Moody |
  • General Privacy News, Governments, Social Media,

Facebook’s massive data leak starts to have important knock-on effects – and potentially serious ones for Ireland

A couple of weeks ago, this blog wrote about Facebook’s huge data leak of 533 million personal data records online. As that post noted, despite the huge numbers involved, this wasn’t the first time sensitive data had been exfiltrated from Facebook on this scale. And yet on this occasion something has changed. Certainly not Facebook’s … Continue reading “Facebook’s massive data leak starts to have important knock-on effects – and potentially serious ones for Ireland”

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  • Apr 13, 2021 |
  • Glyn Moody |
  • General Privacy News, Governments, Surveillance,

Privacy organizations call for facial recognition to be regulated or even banned, as police turn to Clearview AI

At the beginning of last year, concerns about facial recognition technology increased with the appearance of the start-up Clearview AI. It was problematic for two main reasons. First, the size of its database, which the company claimed held over three billion facial images. Secondly, for its business model, which was mainly based on providing police … Continue reading “Privacy organizations call for facial recognition to be regulated or even banned, as police turn to Clearview AI”

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