This revelation is totally appalling and unacceptable, and this shocking revelation, resulting from our subpoena, also provides compelling proof that social networking sites remain ripe with sexual predators.”
Data & Privacy
MySpace Kicks Off 90,000 Registered Sex Offenders
By 2.5.09
Senate Sergeant at Arms Joins Facebook To Apologize To Inaugural Ticket Holders
By 2.1.09
The Senate’s Sergeant at Arms, Terry Gainer, joined Facebook to deliver a picture perfect apology to the survivors of the so-called Purple Tunnel of Doom, a group of several thousand people who were kept out of President Obama’s inauguration even though they had tickets. It takes a superior apology to address a colossal failure, and Gainer certainly delivered. The sincerity and completeness of the apology easily make it one of the best mea culpas we’ve ever seen.
Knowledge Is Power?
By 1.3.09
Self-proclaimed leading contemporary critic of the Internet Andrew Keen says that increased broadband access will lead to a second Holocaust. Seriously.
Don't Worry About AMEX's Bank Yank Clause
By 11.26.08
CreditMattersBlog explains why that new AMEX contract language we wrung our hands over this morning is nothing to fret about.
Dell Downgraded From "Evil" To "Bumbling"
By 9.11.08
“They’ve been downgraded from evil to bumbling.” – Me in FORTUNE about Dell’s online thrusts that attempt to repair their image and listen to their customers more. What do you think? Do you feel any better about them than you did two years ago, or are do their customers still writhe in the eternal flames of “Dell Hell?” Would you add Dell to your Facebook?
Stein Mart Settles Personal Data Breach By Offering… Coupons
By 7.8.08
Stein Mart was caught “printing expiration dates and/or more than the last five digits of credit cards on receipts,” and was subsequently hit with a class action lawsuit for exposing sensitive customer data. Now they’ve settled by agreeing to run coupons in local newspapers. It gets better: instead of a flat 20% off coupon, the store is requiring minimum-purchase amounts that reduce the savings if your purchase falls between the arbitrarily set thresholds.
- $10 off a purchase of $50 or more
- $20 off a purchase of $100 or more
- $30 off a purchase of $150 or more
We need a new federal law that says class action lawyers have to be compensated in the same manner as their clients. Give those hard working guys and gals some $30-off coupons, please!
Montgomery Ward's Hacked 6 Months Ago, But Victims Weren't Told
By 6.30.08
Somewhere between 51,000 and 200,000 records were stolen from Montgomery Ward’s servers last December—the company says it’s the smaller number, but CardCops, the group that spotted the hack in the first place, “spotted hackers touting the sale of 200,000 payment cards belonging to one merchant” in June, which is how the story became public. Montgomery Wards knew about the breach when it happened, and although they reported the crime to federal investigators, they didn’t tell any of the victims. The CEO of Direct Marketing Services, which owns the Montgomery Ward name, told the Associated Press that after he alerted investigators he felt his company “had met its obligations.”
By 6.12.08
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Another article about Facebook applications and their scary privacy implications. Why does a Sudoku puzzle need to know that you have two kids? [Washington Post]
Want To Spy On Comcast Subscribers? Comcast Has The Job For You!
By 6.4.08
If you’d like to help Comcast eavesdrop on its own subscribers, you’re in luck: Comcast has posted a job listing for an “intercept engineer” on a headhunter site, according to Wired. Want ad for position of The Man, inside.
The BBC Writes Application That Steals Personal Info From Facebook
By 5.2.08
Feel wary about giving applications access to your Facebook page? Worried one of those quizzes or games might be maliciously harvesting your data? You were right to worry. The BBC had the same idea, so they decided to write a program to do just that. And it worked. Not only did it steal the data of Facebook users who installed the application, it also victimized all of their “friends.”
Ticketmaster's Facebook Page Is Full Of Fake Friends
By 4.21.08
With over 150,000 fans, Ticketmaster’s Facebook page is one of the most popular. Too bad most of its friends’ profiles are fake.
Woman Sues Blockbuster For Telling All Her Facebook Friends What She Was Renting
By 4.17.08
Facebook’s Beacon has finally resulted in a lawsuit. A Texas woman has sued Blockbuster for participating in Beacon, claiming that “Blockbuster violated the federal Videotape Privacy Protection Act by sharing information about her movie rentals and sales with Facebook without first obtaining her written consent,” says MediaPost.
Are You Sure You Want To Add That Facebook App?
By 3.27.08
Gregory writes in to point out that Facebook does a lousy job of monitoring the development of its third-party Platform applications—and in fact many of them are written so badly that they can be easily hacked. The examples he cites, which are listed in the winter issue of the hacker magazine 2600, are all fairly mild stunts like spoofing user IDs, changing the moods of another user, and re-routing gifts, “but this information could be used to mount large scale social engineering attacks if automated and coupled with other information.” To illustrate how easy it is to change another user’s settings, he pointed us to a YouTube example of how to change another users “mood” via the Mood app.
Facebook Takes Letting The Whole World See Your Private Photos Seriously
By 3.25.08
THE QUOTE:“We take privacy very seriously and continue to make enhancements to the site,” said a Facebook spokesperson.
Pizza Hut Forces You To Opt-In To Spam Marketing When Ordering Online
By 3.14.08
When you place an order on Pizza Hut’s website, you have to create an account, and to create an account, you have to check the box that says you agree to their privacy policy and terms of use. It also says, “I agree to receive information about Pizza Hut®/WingStreet® couons, promotions, announcements, events and specials.” This e-commerce blogger is amazed that Pizza Hut would resort to such a sneaky tactic, which ultimately ruins the customer experience and probably costs them online orders.
Round 2: Facebook vs The American Arbitration Association
By 3.13.08
This is round 2 in our Worst Company In America contest, Facebook vs The American Arbitration Association. Their major crimes: The American Arbitration Association is the main supplier of kangaroo courts to companies who want to deprive consumers of most of their rights in the event of a legal dispute. Most contracts you sign with companies these days contain a mandatory arbitration clause. Facebook is a social networking site for yupsters that for a while was spying on all your purchases and selling the data to big big advertisers so they could sell you more ads. Which is the greater threat to our way of life? Choose!
Librarian Takes Sprint Nextel & Wells-Fargo To Small Claims Court And Wins
By 2.22.08
Last December, Theodore Karantsalis received a letter from Sprint, where he was a customer, telling him that someone who banks with Wells-Fargo—where he’s not a customer—was presented with his invoice and personal data when they logged into their Wells-Fargo Checkfree account. The customer contacted Sprint, and Sprint contacted Karantsalis. Karantsalis decided that he’d deal with the issue on his own instead of bringing a lawyer into it or throwing his hands up in frustration, so he took both companies to small claims court.
