Information Security & Occasional Forays Into Adjacent Realms
via El Reg's Kieren McCarthy - reporting from San Francisco - CA, comes an excoriating analysis of the corrupt sale of the TLD commonly known as .ORG*, and actions thereabouts. Read it and weep for your Interwebs.
'Let’s check in on the .org sale fiasco: Senators say No, internet grandees say Yes – and ICANN pretends there's absolutely nothing to see here' - via El Reg's Kieren McCarthy
via Kieren McCarthy, reporting for the venerable El Reg, comes timely reportage exposing the greed (not to mention the hubris) of the shell game being played by ISOC, ICANN and others of note. Redact Away, Me Buckos!
Outstanding reports - via Norwegian Forbrukerrådet detailing the systematic criminal behavior exhibited by Advertising Entites and their Ilk, with the resultant aglommeration of data which permits them significant and increasing leverage against the owners of that personal data (and the ability to generate significant revenue with the sale of that data). Time for this to end, don't you agree? H/T
Quite likely, the single most important Privacy related paper you should examine. Today's Must Grok.
It's an astonishing state of affairs, when the Public Internet Registry (PIR) can sell itself, without clear oversight and scrutiny as the sole administrator of the .ORG TLD (efectively meaning the conveyance of ownership of the .ORG TLD) to a private equity firm... Read Jon Brodkins' take at Ars Technica on this...
via Jon Brodkin, reporting at Ars Technica comes this story of Those Terrible People In The Cable Industry.
The latest outrage from the Cable Industry (in the United States, at least) is to direct their trade lobby group in pitching Senators and Representatives alike to punch the Nay Button in an effort to fight Anti-Robocalling legislation. Time to really cut the cord, methinks?
'"Cable lobby NCTA–The Internet & Television Association last week told the FCC in a filing that "these requests for mandatory requirements should be rejected."' - via Jon Brodkin, reporting at Ars Technica
Bad behavior by Bezos' Amazon and subsidiary Ring is tainting any police investigation at it's most fundamental levels by forcing secret agreements, and endorsments for the company's products. Jeff Bezos', where is your shame?
The memorandum of understanding is pitched as "a solution to the Lakeland Police Department to help reduce crime and assist with investigations in your community." The document, which includes an "Amazon Legal" watermark, was signed by Ring and Lakeland Police Department representatives on December 13, 2018. - via Caroline Haskins, writing at Vice's Motherboard.
via Sam Biddle, writing at The Intercept, comes this astonishing story of manifest Facebookery firmly situated within the rarified telecom world of data sharing between and betwixt the telecom leviathans and that scourge of privacy Facebook, Inc. (Nasdaq:FB). h/t
“What they’re doing is filtering Facebook users on creditworthiness criteria and potentially escaping the application of the Fair Credit Reporting Act. … It’s no different from Equifax providing the data to Chase.” - via Sam Biddle, reporting for The Intercept, with this superb article
via Nicholas Vinocour, reporting at Politico, of the apparent enforcement shortcomings evidenced by the European Union's GDPR Data Protection Commission (in this case, the entity entrusted with the enforcement of the GDPR is the Republic of Ireleand's Data Protection Commission). Today's Must Read! h/t
News of recently revealed and egregious tracking behaviors at Google Inc. (Nasdaq: GOOG); specifically Google is using your Gmails account to track your purchases. Our suggestions is to immediately remove any financial transaction related messaging from your Gmail accounts without delay - unless of course, you trust Google...
"While Google told us that you can delete this information at any time, they did not mention how much of a pain it is to do so. Instead of having a single setting that allows you to control how this data is saved, you need to go into each and every purchase and click on the Remove Purchase button. This will bring you to the original email that the data was pulled from and once this email is trashed, the purchase will be removed from the Purchases page. " - via Lawrence Abrams, reporting at Bleeping COmputer
You Can Successfully Bet The Chairman Will Be Implicated In This...
via Jon Brodkin, writing at Condé Nast media property Ars Technica, in which, Mr. Brodkin reports on bad news for Chairman Ajit Pai, as the FCC was forced to settle a suit (to the tune of 43K) brought by independent writer Jason Prechtel where the FCC refused to comply with a FOIA request for data related to the Commissions'repeal of net neutrality. Folks, that's $43,000 of US taxpayer money paid out (legitimately) to a suit plaintiff (and rightly so, to cover his attorney's fees and court costs), that would not have occurred if we had an honest FCC Chairman in place.
"The FCC didn't comply with the request and allegedly didn't even approve or deny the FoIA request within the legally allotted timeframe, so Prechtel sued the commission in September 2017. One year later, a US District Court judge presiding over the case ordered the FCC to stop withholding certain records sought by Prechtel, although the ruling didn't give Prechtel everything he asked for." via Jon Brodkin, writing at Ars Technica, in a report detailing a settlement forced on the FCC by Judge Christopher Cooper of US District Court for the District of Columbia (Ars Technica's PDF link).
Another reason to not put significant trust in the United Nations.
"In an email to the ICAO, the Lockheed Martin cyberintelligence analyst described the attack as "a significant threat to the aviation industry." It had the characteristics of a "watering hole attack" that targets visitors to a website. The UN agency, working with 192 member states and industry groups, is responsible for setting international civil aviation standards, including for safety and security." - via PhysOrg