Friday, April 18, 2008
Ars Technica
Jacqui Cheng of Ars Technica reports on a class-action lawsuit recently filed against Blockbuster over their involvement with Beacon, an intrusive advertising tool used by Facebook. Beacon was released last November as a new marketing strategy. Working with a number of companies, including Blockbuster, Beacon publicly posts, onto the Facebook user’s page, online transactions they made with these companies. For example, whatever movie you rented online from Blockbuster would be posted on your page for the world to see. This is a direct violation of the Video Privacy Protection Act which prohibits providers from exposing a person’s video renting or buying habits without their consent. Cathryn Elaine Harris filed the complaint and is asking for $2,500 per each incident in which her personal information was exposed, court cost and demands an order for Blockbuster to remove all personal information that has been illegally distributed.
Friday, April 18, 2008
WTHR
Richard Essex of WTHR Channel 13 Eyewitness News reports, hundreds of thousands of Hoosier’s sensitive information may now be in the hands of thieves. Central Collection Bureau (CCB), the owner of a Southside collection agency had eight computers stolen from the office on March 21, 2008. The computers contained the names, addresses, Social Security numbers and in some cases medical codes of 700,000 Indiana residents. Doctors, hospitals and even utility companies hire this company to collect delinquent bills. CCB’s Chet Klene explains that all the computers were password protected, although many IT people feel that any good hacker could gain access. CCB is working on notifying people that could have possibly had information on their computers and is suggesting a credit freeze or at least the monitoring of credit reports. Make sure to do this will all three credit companies: Experian, Equifax and Transunion. Central Collection Bureau is asking you to call if you believe you’ve been affected 317-887-5165 or 1-800-878-5165 or you can email CCB through their site for more information. Also, at the bottom of this article is a list of companies that employed CCB.
Thursday, April 17, 2008
PC World
Grant Gross of PC World reports, the efforts of e-commerce sites and online advertisers to inform consumers about privacy risks and behavioral targeting advertising are not enough according to privacy advocates. Leaders of the Electronic Privacy Information Center and the Center for Digital Democracy met Thursday at a forum to ask Congress to pass online privacy regulations. Some ideas include a “do-not-track” list similar to the current “do-not-call” list for telemarketers or more advanced “opt-out” choices. Many don’t understand their online privacy because companies are constantly changing the way they use personal information. Both Google and AOL are initiating campaigns to educate users on their privacy policies, but the problem is most people don’t take the time to read through this information. In this rapidly expanding industry of online advertising, it is clear that a government regulated code of conduct is in order.
Wednesday, April 16, 2008
FCW.com
The House has voted to approve a bill that will require the Internal Revenue Service to alert taxpayers if identity theft is suspected, reports Mary Mosquera of FCW.com. This Taxpayer Assistance and Simplification Act of 2008 will also repeal the IRS’ right to use private agencies to help collect outstanding tax debts. Private debt collectors for the IRS are expensive, but they normally handle the easier cases allowing the IRS employees to focus on the more complex cases. Sen. Charles Grassley opposes this bill and urges the critics of the private collection program to consider the IRS’ inability to collect the $345 billion in owed taxes. On the other hand, it’s promising that this new bill will help protect against identity theft and protect taxpayers from scams.
Thursday, April 17, 2008
The Washington Post
According to Ellen Nakashima and Spencer Hsu of the Washington Post, the U.S. government will begin collecting DNA from criminals charged with federal offenses and from immigrants detained by federal authorities. This will add genetic information for over 1 million people a year into the rapidly growing database of government law enforcement. This will be the first time DNA samples will be collected from people other than U.S. citizens. Privacy advocates say this goes beyond the FBI’s initial goal to store information on violent criminals. They are also concerned that this information will be permanently retained in the database system even if the person is found innocent or the case is dropped. Paromita Shah, associate director of the National Immigration Project of the National Lawyers Guild, explains that immigrants are usually detained for administrative violations, not federal crimes. This data collection casts them as criminals. DNA collection has helped solve thousands of cases, but each year the category of crime from which they take samples broadens. If this continues, someday they might be taking DNA samples for traffic violations.
Tuesday, April 15, 2008
The Washington Post
According to Carrie Johnson of the Washington Post, bipartisan lawmakers are trying to place new controls on the FBI’s access to limitless personal data of American citizens. Current FBI agents argue they need more time to clean up past abuses of this data. Next week, hearings will discuss the FBI’s use of national security letters to gain information about telephone, email and financial records without following appropriate procedures. The Justice Department’s inspector issued a report in 2007 citing repeated breaches and numerous unwarranted searches by the FBI. This new bill would force the FBI to destroy information that has been illegally obtained. It also would allow the recipients of these letters to file civil lawsuits if the probe cannot be justified. Further, it would force the FBI to track the use of these letters and limit the types of records that can be obtained by them. Officials at the Justice Department’s National Security Division and the FBI have acknowledged problems with the use of national security letters in the past. They claim to have stepped up training programs, implemented internal reviews, and developed new databases to improve accuracy of internal tracking and accounting. Hearings begin this afternoon with supporters such as: David Kris, an expert in national security law who worked in the Clinton and Bush administrations; Bruce Fein, a Justice Department official in the Reagan era; and Jameel Jaffer, director of the national security project at the American Civil Liberties Union.
Tuesday, April 15, 2008
The Charleston Gazette
According to the Charleston Gazette, West Virginia’s Marshall University must identify seven students accused of illegally downloading music. U.S. Magistrate Maurice G. Taylor issued a subpoena giving the university 30 days to produce the names of these students. The university argued that the subpoena was too broad and would cost an estimated $337.50 to investigate the seven Internet addresses. Also, identifying the students would violate privacy laws. The Recording Industry Association of America has already sued over 30,000 people over the illegal downloading of music. Many of these are college students using their university’s Internet services. Most of these cases have been settled with each defendant paying the record companies a few thousand dollars. To avoid this, make sure to legally download music because record companies are watching.
Sunday, April 12, 2008
LA Times
A group of medical groups and child advocates asked the Federal Trade Commission for guidelines to prevent companies from online data tracking of minors, reports Joseph Menn and Alana Semuels of the LA Times. They argue that many adolescents are giving up too much information on social-networking sites like MySpace and Facebook. They also do not understand complex privacy policies. The American Academy of Pediatrics, the American Psychiatric Association and also some nonprofit groups asked the FTC to stop the Internet industry from profiling children. This profiling, called behavioral targeting is an industry expected to be worth billions in the next few years. They serve advertisements based on the Web searches and interest of the people from whom the data is collected. Teens are among the most active Internet users. Therefore, their interests are the most sought-after by advertisers. On the other hand, they are the least likely to understand how to stop their personal information from being tracked. In response to this plea, a trade group representing more than 95% of the online ad-distribution industry claims it is willing to stop the use of behavioral data to target children under age 13.
Monday, April 14, 2008
Computer World
According to Computer World’s Mark Hall, when it comes to protecting the privacy of their patrons’ reading habits, librarians go the extra mile. Some companies should stop and think about how far they will go to protect their customers and employees information. The FBI can serve the library with a National Security Letter (NSL), which demands information about what kind of books a person has been reading. It also imposes a gag order; the librarian is not allowed to tell someone if they’re being investigated. In 2005, a Connecticut library received a NSL and ignoring the gag order, took the government to court with the help of the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU). The next year, the government decided to stop defending the gag order. Deborah Caldwell-Stone, deputy director in the office of intellectual freedom for the American Library Association (ALA) in Chicago, states that protecting customers’ privacies is an ethical obligation of a librarian. ALA members perform regular privacy audits to make sure that their patrons’ privacies remain protected. This practice could be implemented in corporations to prevent embarrassing data breach accidents.
Thursday, April 10, 2008
Computer World
To offer more personalized services, some Vegas hotels are using RFID chip tracking devices, according to Patrick Thibodeau of Computer World. These chips are used as a loss-prevention method in the pour spouts of liquor bottles from the bar. Tracking how heavy the bartender is pouring the drinks is just the beginning. According to Tom Peck, MGM Mirage’s senior vice president and CIO, they plan to use many new technologies to change how services are delivered. These include predicting what a customer wants and also systems that will prepare the room for new arrivals, including turning on the lights, adjusting the blinds and setting the television to the guest’s preferred language. Another new technology will place RFID chips into the room key. This key will not only allow access to the room, it will also track customer preferences and gaming play. This service will be an option because some guest will not want to be tracked. The goal is to create a personalized concierge service for a large number of customers. All of this information is stored by the company and right now they have over 85 million records. Luckily, this technology is subject to heavy state and federal regulations, so hopefully, it will be safe.
http://www.gametechsummit.com/2008docs_images/TomPeck.pdf
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