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Credit to Author: Mike Elgan| Date: Sat, 11 Mar 2017 04:00:00 -0800
Everybody’s freaking out over the Wikileaks revelations that the Central Intelligence Agency can hack Apple and Android smartphones, major PC operating systems — and even TV sets.
The news is causing ripples in international relations and got companies like Google and Apple to patch holes and issue fixes.
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Credit to Author: Gregg Keizer| Date: Thu, 09 Mar 2017 10:37:00 -0800
China today asked the U.S. government to stop spying on it, China’s first reaction to WikiLeaks’ disclosure of a trove of CIA documents that alleged the agency was able to hack smartphones, personal computers, routers and other digital devices worldwide.
“We urge the U.S. to stop listening in, monitoring, stealing secrets and [conducting] cyber-attacks against China and other countries,” said Geng Shuang, a Foreign Ministry spokesman said today in a Beijing press briefing.
Geng also said that China would protect its own networks, was willing to work with others toward what he called “orderly cyberspace,” and repeated his government’s stock denunciation of hacking.
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Credit to Author: Grant Gross| Date: Thu, 09 Mar 2017 08:53:00 -0800
Information about purported CIA cyberattacks was “passed around” among members of the U.S. intelligence community and contractors before it was published by WikiLeaks this week, Julian Assange says.
The CIA “lost control of its entire cyberweapons arsenal,” the WikiLeaks editor-in-chief said during a press conference Thursday. “This is a historic act of devastating incompetence, to have created such an arsenal and stored all in one place and not secured it.”
Assange declined to name the source who gave the information to WikiLeaks, but he seemed to suggest the 8,700-plus documents, purportedly from an isolated CIA server, came from an insider source.
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Credit to Author: John Ribeiro| Date: Wed, 08 Mar 2017 04:40:00 -0800
A U.S. senator is seeking answers about a data breach involving smart toys made by Spiral Toys, writing a letter to the company’s CEO asking about the company’s security practices.
Bill Nelson, a Florida Democrat, wrote in a letter Tuesday to CEO Mark Meyers that the breach raises serious questions concerning how well the company protects the information it collects, particularly from children.
Nelson also said that the incident raises questions about the vendor’s compliance with the Children’s Online Privacy Protection Act, which requires covered companies to have reasonable procedures to protect the confidentiality, security and integrity of personal information collected from children.
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Credit to Author: John Ribeiro| Date: Wed, 08 Mar 2017 03:57:00 -0800
A resolution introduced in the U.S. Senate on Tuesday aims to roll back privacy rules for broadband service providers that were approved by the Federal Communications Commission in October.
The rules include the requirement that internet service providers like Comcast, AT&T, and Verizon obtain “opt-in” consent from consumers to use and share sensitive personal information such as geolocation and web browsing history and also give customers the choice to opt out from the sharing of non-sensitive information such as email addresses or service tier information.
The rules have been opposed by ISPs that argue that they are being treated differently from other Internet entities like search engines and social networking companies.
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Credit to Author: Stephen Lawson| Date: Mon, 06 Mar 2017 18:10:00 -0800
Nearly two-thirds of consumers are worried about home IoT devices listening in on their conversations, according to a Gartner survey released Monday.
Those jitters aren’t too surprising after recent news items about TV announcers inadvertently activating viewers’ Amazon Echos, or about data from digital assistants being used as evidence in criminal trials. But privacy concerns are just one hurdle smart homes still have to overcome, according to the survey.
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Credit to Author: Michael Kan| Date: Mon, 06 Mar 2017 14:01:00 -0800
Consumer Reports, a major source for gadget and appliance reviews in the U.S., plans to start rating products on data security and privacy.
On Monday, the nonprofit publication unveiled a set of new testing standards it hopes will push the tech industry to create safer products.
“The goal is to help consumers understand which digital products do the most to protect their privacy and security, and give them the most control over their personal data,” the publication said.
Already, cybersecurity experts are finding new tech products, whether they are cars or smart teddy bears, that are often poorly secured and easy to hack.
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Credit to Author: Grant Gross| Date: Wed, 01 Mar 2017 12:05:00 -0800
Any reform of a controversial U.S. law allowing the National Security Agency to spy on people overseas will likely focus on its impact on U.S. residents, without curbing its use elsewhere.
Section 702 of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA) expires on Dec. 31, and some digital rights groups are calling on Congress to overhaul the law to protect the privacy of residents of both the U.S. and other countries. Congress will almost certainly extend the provision in some form.
But a congressional hearing on Wednesday focused largely on the NSA’s “inadvertent” collection of U.S. residents’ data, with little time given to the privacy concerns of people overseas.
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