Tag: smartphones
  • Jul 22, 2021 |
  • Glyn Moody |
  • Censorship, Encryption, General Privacy News, Governments, Social Media, Surveillance,

What the Pegasus Spyware Leak Means for Surveillance, Smartphones & Encryption Backdoors

A few months ago, we wrote about dual-use surveillance systems – that is, technology that can be used for both peaceful and military purposes. The post discussed some limited efforts by the EU to prevent such technologies from being abused. A major new leak of alleged targets of one of the leading spyware companies, the … Continue reading “What the Pegasus Spyware Leak Means for Surveillance, Smartphones & Encryption Backdoors”

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  • May 13, 2021 |
  • Glyn Moody |
  • Cybersecurity, Encryption, General Privacy News, Governments, Social Media,

Anthropologists say smartphones are now “the place where we live”: what does that mean for privacy?

The modern smartphone is a wonder. In terms of raw computing power, an article on ZME Science compared an iPhone 6 with the computers used to send astronauts to the moon: the iPhone 6’s clock is 32,600 times faster than the best Apollo era computers and could perform instructions 120,000,000 times faster. You wouldn’t be … Continue reading “Anthropologists say smartphones are now “the place where we live”: what does that mean for privacy?”

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  • Oct 23, 2020 |
  • Caleb Chen |
  • Cybersecurity, General Privacy News, Governments, Surveillance,

Police across America can break into locked phones, and often do so without a warrant

A new report by non profit in Washington D.C. has used FOIA requests to highlight that police departments across the country have tools to break into phones and download all data. The report is called “Mass Extraction: The Widespread Power of U.S. Law Enforcement to Search Mobile Phones.” Over 2,000 FOIA requests, Upturn discovered that … Continue reading “Police across America can break into locked phones, and often do so without a warrant”

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  • Oct 7, 2020 |
  • Caleb Chen |
  • General Privacy News, Social Media, Surveillance,

Survey finds 85% of smartphone users believe they’re being spied on by a mobile app

A new survey by WhistleOut provides some numbers to back up a growing sentiment: That an app on your smartphone is spying on you right this second while you read this article. The latest numbers from the smartphone industry estimates that the average smartphone user has between 60 and 90 apps. Additionally, the average smartphone … Continue reading “Survey finds 85% of smartphone users believe they’re being spied on by a mobile app”

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  • Sep 2, 2020 |
  • Glyn Moody |
  • Censorship, Encryption, General Privacy News, Governments, Surveillance,

The privacy perils of using a mesh network – and why we urgently need one that is robust and open source

One of the reasons why protecting privacy is so hard is that our data is vulnerable in so many ways as it flows across the Internet. Threats can come from the companies that run online services, ISPs, telecom companies and governments. That’s bad enough for everyday situations, but in extreme ones, those weaknesses can have … Continue reading “The privacy perils of using a mesh network – and why we urgently need one that is robust and open source”

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  • Jan 9, 2020 |
  • Caleb Chen |
  • Cybersecurity, General Privacy News,

Android community worried about presence of “Chinese spyware” by Qihoo 360 in Samsung smartphones and tablets

Earlier this week, the Android community on Reddit erupted in discussion over a thread titled: “Chinese Spyware Pre-Installed on All Samsung Phones (& Tablets)” that has since been labeled as misleading by moderators. In addition, it’s also been noted by observant redditors that the original poster (OP) of the thread may have been a purchased … Continue reading “Android community worried about presence of “Chinese spyware” by Qihoo 360 in Samsung smartphones and tablets”

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  • Oct 26, 2019 |
  • Glyn Moody |
  • General Privacy News, Governments, Surveillance,

Smartphones with wheels: how modern transportation brings new privacy problems

Tracking vehicles as a way of carrying out surveillance has been used by governments around the world for years. When exactly it should be allowed is still a hot topic, in the US at least. And it’s not just the police that use tracking devices. Recently it emerged that the car manufacturer Mercedes has covertly … Continue reading “Smartphones with wheels: how modern transportation brings new privacy problems”

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  • Oct 3, 2019 |
  • Caleb Chen |
  • Cybersecurity, General Privacy News, Surveillance,

Millions of smartphones vulnerable to SimJacker mobile phone exploit

Earlier this month, Adaptive Mobile Security released a report on a vulnerability and set of exploits which have since been named SimJacker. Adaptive Mobile Security showed that this attack vector has been used for at least the last two years to hack into target mobile phones. The security firm was able to identify that the … Continue reading “Millions of smartphones vulnerable to SimJacker mobile phone exploit”

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The next great platform shift is underway, and that could be really bad for privacy

The first computing era was based on the keyboard. Mainframes, minicomputers, personal computers – they were all controlled using fingers typing out commands. Later on, the graphical front end of the Macintosh and Windows allowed people to point and click, but the keyboard was still there for text to be entered at some point. The … Continue reading “The next great platform shift is underway, and that could be really bad for privacy”

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  • Oct 18, 2017 |
  • Caleb Chen |
  • Cybersecurity, General Privacy News, Surveillance,

How to stop your mobile phone number and location from being sold

Smartphone users are becoming aware that their phone number and location isn’t private when they use the internet on their data plans thanks to the selling of your mobile advertising id (MAID). According to Wired’s Andy Greenberg, it only costs $1,000 to track someone online. When you visit a website on your smartphone, both the … Continue reading “How to stop your mobile phone number and location from being sold”

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