If you don’t need a special selfie lens that puts a wagging animals ears and a pink cartoon tongue onto your face when you’re communicating with your friends — or just want to save on mobile data — Facebook is now launching its Messenger Lite Android app in U.S. [More]
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If You Don’t Want AccuWeather Sharing Your Location Even When You’re Not Using It, Update Your App Now
By 8.23.17
We’ve all been there: You download a new app to your phone or tablet and are asked to share your location data — even when you’re not using the service. In most cases, you can say no and go about your day knowing that the app isn’t following your every move. But that’s apparently not the case with AccuWeather, as security researchers say the app is accessing users’ location data even when they turn off location services. [More]
Uber Settles Federal Allegations It Deceived Customers About Privacy & Data Security
By 8.15.17
Uber has reached a deal with the Federal Trade Commission to settle the government’s investigation into the ride-hailing service’s allegedly questionable privacy practices.
[More]
Customer Records For Millions Of Verizon Subscribers Exposed
By 7.12.17 — Updated: 7.13.17
It’s a day ending in the letter “Y,” so we’re not surprised that yet another breach of customer information is making the news: In the latest, a cyber security firm says information for at least 14 million Verizon residential and small business wireline customers was found on an unsecured web server, allowing anyone on the Internet to access it. Verizon says that figure was closer to six million customer records. [More]
Feds Shut Down Loan Application Sites That Illegally Sold Personal Data
By 7.6.17
There are a lot of people who need to borrow money quickly but don’t know where to go for a loan. So they go online, where there are plenty of shady operators promising to connect loan applicants with lenders. What the borrower doesn’t know is that these lead generators may also be selling their personal information with third parties who have nothing to do with that loan. [More]
The ‘Infinite Campaign’ Creates Absurdly Specific Twitter Ads Based On Your Supposed Interests
By 7.5.17
We may be getting used to seeing targeted online ad campaigns based on our browsing history and social media interactions, but what about ads that are literally nothing more than generic statements of what Twitter’s ad-targeting algorithm thinks about us? [More]
Teens Aren’t Getting Summer Jobs Anymore Because They’re Too Busy Studying
By 6.6.17
It was once a rite of passage for American teenagers: Spend the summer slinging burgers, watching over the frolicking kids at the local pools, hawking apparel at the mall, or babysitting for the neighbor in order to earn a few bucks. But it turns out that fewer teens are taking part in the tradition of obtaining a summer job, despite an apparent plethora of opportunities to do so. [More]
Do You Use OneLogin? Change Your Password Now
By 6.1.17
If you use OneLogin to keep all your, well, login information straight, it’s time to change your password, as the password manager’s U.S. data centers are at the center of the latest hack attack. [More]
Bank Sends Tax Forms, Personal Information To Wrong Customers
By 5.19.17
Tax forms mailed out by your bank contain all sorts of information you probably don’t want to land in the hands of a random stranger: Name, address, partial Social Security number, account number, and more. Yet, one large bank screwed up and sent this sensitive information to the wrong customers. [More]
There’s Something Called ‘Twitter Lite’ Now
By 4.6.17 — Updated: 5.10.17
Do you like to Tweet on the go, but hate wasting your data (assuming you haven’t jumped on the wireless industry’s unlimited plan bandwagon)? Twitter has a new option for you: The social media site launched a mobile browser version of its site, dubbed “Twitter Lite.” [More]
Apple Says Systems Not Breached After Hackers Threaten To Wipe Millions Of iPhones
By 3.23.17
Earlier this week, a group of hackers claimed to have email addresses and passwords for hundreds of millions of Apple accounts, and that it would use this information to remotely erase massive numbers of iPhones if a ransom weren’t paid. For its part, Apple says no account information was stolen from its servers. [More]
Hackers Say They Will Wipe iPhones Unless Apple Pays Ransom
By 3.21.17
Hundreds of millions of iPhone owners may be up a creek next month, at least according to a hacker group that claims to have unprecedented access to the devices and is threatening to remotely wipe them clean if Apple doesn’t pay up. [More]
Saks Fifth Avenue Customer Email Addresses Posted Publicly
By 3.20.17
The email addresses for thousands of Saks Fifth Avenue customers were sitting on the retailer’s website, unencrypted, for an unknown period of time. [More]
Amazon Hands Over Echo Recording Related To Murder Investigation
By 3.7.17
Just two weeks after Amazon filed a motion claiming that turning over information stored on an Echo speaker located inside a murder suspect’s home would be a violation of privacy, the e-commerce giant abandoned its argument after the suspect in the case consented to the release of the information. [More]
Verizon Revises Deal To Buy Yahoo At $350M Discount
By 2.21.17
If you found out after you got engaged that your soon-to-be better half had done something that made you question the impending union, what would you do — Cancel the wedding? Move the reception from the country club to your cousin’s backyard? If you’re Verizon and your betrothed is the data-breached Yahoo, you ask for a $350 million discount. [More]
Police Charge Arson Suspect Based On Records From His Pacemaker
By 2.7.17
How would you weigh the choice to have a pacemaker implanted if you knew that information from the device could be used against you in a criminal case? A man in Ohio is having his own cardiac rhythm used against him as he faces charges of aggravated arson and insurance fraud. This week, he pleaded not guilty to those charges. [More]
Court: No, You Don’t Have a Reasonable Expectation Of Privacy With Your PSN Account
By 1.19.17
How do you communicate with most of the folks in your life, these days? Is it face-to-face, or is it digital communication over someone else’s private service? If it’s the latter, there’s a recent court ruling from a federal court in Kansas that should remind you about where you should — and shouldn’t — reasonably expect your data to remain private. [More]
Uber Trying To Make Nice With Cities By Sharing Traffic Data
By 1.9.17
Have you ever watched a busy downtown city street and wondered how many of those cars are Ubers, how far they’re going, and how long it usually takes them to get there? City planners and transit administrators do, and so to make their lives a little easier, Uber’s planning to start giving away some aggregated, public-interest data to help transit planners plan. [More]
