Group items tagged

"We've discussed the stupidity of privacy policies many times in the past. Honestly, it's an idea that serves no useful purpose, yet most sites are required to have one, and if you don't, people get all upset. But no one reads them, and most people incorrectly assume that if a site has any privacy policy, they must keep data private. "

"Welcome to the Age of Privacy Nihilism Google and Facebook are easy scapegoats, but companies have been collecting, selling, and reusing your personal data for decades, and now that the public has finally noticed, it's too late. The personal-data privacy war is long over, and you lost."

Wearable sensor technology has the potential to transform health care and our understanding of our own bodies and habits. The investigation and testing of these sensors in the commercial sector offer an unprecedented opportunity to leverage biometric data, both to improve individual health through the development of better products and to advance the public good through research. However, research with wearable sensor data must be done in a manner that is respectful of ethical considerations and consumer privacy

"Web rivals' business models undermine users' privacy, says Tim Cook, who also warns governments on pursuing 'dangerous' encryption policies"

"Google CEO Eric Schmidt says privacy isn't important, and if you want to keep something private, "maybe you shouldn't be doing it in the first place" (in other words, "innocent people have nothing to hide.")"

Privacy is a hot-button issue in the tech world. How will it fare in the age of pervasive computing - a world of billions of connected devices, systems, and services exchanging personal data?

Privacy icons for Mozilla...

London's Metropolitan Police have been urged to back down on plans to once again use facial recognition software at next weekend's Notting Hill Carnival. Privacy groups including Big Brother Watch, Liberty and Privacy International have written to police commissioner Cressida Dick (PDF) calling for a U-turn on the use of the tech. Automated facial recognition technology will snap the party-goers' faces, and run them against a database. The aim is to alert cops to people who are banned from the festival or are wanted by the police, presumably so they can take immediate action. The tech was first tested at the festival - where relations between police and revellers are often strained - last year, but it failed to identify anyone.

Using Docracy's unique document change analysis, we are now tracking terms of service and privacy policies for hundreds of the world's top sites. See below for summaries of recent changes, or to see the complete terms for any of the sites we track.

Guard is a site that uses AI to read epically long privacy policies and then highlight any aspects of them that might be problematic.

"You are being watched. Private and state-sponsored organizations are monitoring and recording your online activities. privacytools.io provides knowledge and tools to protect your privacy against global mass surveillance."

openPDS/SafeAnswers allows users to collect, store, and give fine-grained access to their data all while protecting their privacy.

"OpenDP is a community effort to build trustworthy, open-source software tools for statistical analysis of sensitive private data. These tools, which we call OpenDP, will offer the rigorous protections of differential privacy for the individuals who may be represented in confidential data and statistically valid methods of analysis for researchers who study the data. "

"Facebook-owned messaging giant WhatsApp has announced a big change to its privacy policy which, once a user accepts its new T&Cs, will see it start to share some user data with its parent company - including for ad-targeting purposes on the latter service."

"Just one day after WhatsApp revealed a sea-change in its attitude to user data, by detailing plans to share the mobile numbers and last seen status of its users with parent company Facebook for ad-targeting and marketing purposes, the UK's data protection watchdog has fired a warning shot across Zuckerberg's bows by announcing it intends to investigate the arrangement"

"Uber is now tracking your location even after you leave the car. A location-tracking feature that the ride-sharing company proposed last year has gone live, despite fierce opposition from privacy advocates."

Within two weeks of its release last month, Pokemon Go, the augmented reality gaming sensation, surpassed, by one estimate, Twitter, Facebook, and Netflix in its day-to-day popularity on Android phones. Over on Apple devices, the game was downloaded more times in its first week than any app that came before it.

"Toys and other devices are collecting loads of data from children. What could go wrong?"

"A leading privacy activist says Google's lack of support for strong encryption makes second-class citizens out of people who can't afford Apple devices."