Security

Do Apple, Google and Microsoft Know Your Every Step? A Handy Chart

A fun side-effect of the iOS secret-tracking fiasco is that a lot of other different types of location data and transmissions to and from your smartphone are being conflated into a huge pile of fevered paranoia. But! Don’t freak out. To simplify all this (hopefully), here’s a chart that lays out what’s happening on three…

Tech News Matt Buchanan

Hide Your Data Through Fragmentation, Not Encryption

The thing about data encryption is that it’s basically a flashing neon sign indicating “SENSITIVE DATA HERE!” A new technique lets you secure your data by customizing the way that data is fragmented across your drive. The new method uses special software to place data on specific parts of your hard disc using a code…

Privacy & Security Kyle Wagner

Why Apple Collects Detailed Location Data from Your iPhone

All iSpy conspiracy bullshit aside, you are probably more interested in what your iPhone does with location data. Well, if you opt-in to the iPhone’s location services, detailed—but anonymized—location data is transmitted back to Apple on a regular basis. Gadget Lab reminds us of a letter Apple general counsel Bruce Sewell sent to a couple…

Tech News Matt Buchanan

Top 5 Musical Uses for Your iPhone’s Formerly Secret Location Log

As reported by Alasdair Allan and Pete Warden on O’Reilly on Wednesday, Apple’s iPhone and iPads with cellular data connections have been recording their users’ whereabouts in a file that gets backed up to their computers for reasons unknown. This is bad news for privacy advocates, and computer users of all kinds, for that matter,…

Tech News Eliot Van Buskirk - Evolver.fm

Why Your iPhone Is Secretly Tracking You: A Very Probable Explanation (Updated)

Why has your iPhone been secretly recording everywhere you go since iOS4, in a way that a simple program can extract everywhere you’ve been from either your iPhone or your computer? Well, probably, a bug. Or “more likely, an oversight,” according to John Gruber and his sources (who, for the uninitiated, are most probably inside…

Tech News Matt Buchanan

World’s Smallest Vein Sensor Reads Veins for Secure Access to Laptops

Instead of scanning fingerprints to determine a person is who they say they are (unless they’re holding someone’s dismembered finger, naturally), Fujitsu’s vein sensor does the job…only in a much smaller device, measuring just 29mm wide, 11.2mm tall, and 29mm thick. In fact, the hand doesn’t even have to touch the sensor, with a small…

Privacy & Security Kat Hannaford

If You Complain About the TSA, You’re More Likely to Be Screened by the TSA

You gotta hand it to the TSA, they’re really good at making you hate traveling. CNN has recently obtained a list of 70 “behavioral indicators” that the TSA uses to identify potentially high risk passengers and one of ’em is if you complain about the TSA. It’s circular reasoning at is finest, and is best…

Privacy & Security Casey Chan

Brazilian Police to Wear Glasses That Can Scan Faces to Find Criminals

In technology that is lifted straight from Robocop, Brazilian cops will be outfitted with glasses that can scan faces in a crowd and automatically pick out criminals. The glasses use advanced facial recognition technology that can scan 400 faces a second at 50 yards away. Facial profiling! The glasses scans 46,000 biometric points on a…

Privacy & Security Casey Chan

French Hacker Gets Arrested After Boasting of Devious Crimes on TV

It would’ve been hardly surprising when the cops turned up on the doorstep of the French hacker who appeared on national TV to boast of how he hacked the French Army and Thales information security group’s network. Initially aligning himself with the Anonymous group (who later distanced themselves from him, by stating it wasn’t the…

Privacy & Security Kat Hannaford

Control Your Logitech Security Cameras from Your iPad

With Logitech’s new iPad app for its Alert Security Cameras, you can use your tablet to keep an eye on untrustworthy babysitters, look in on sick children, or just stare at your front door for hours on end. The app gives you control over Logitech’s Alert Security Camera, which was released last year and streams…

Tech News Kyle Wagner

BlackBerry Boss Angrily Storms Out of a BBC Interview

RIM’s Co-CEO Mike Lazaridis is on a roll with expressing his feelings of anger/hurt/outrage, as shown in a NYT interview yesterday and now a cut-short video with the BBC, which dared to ask about the “security problem” of the last year which saw BlackBerry services temporarily terminated in the Middle East and India. https://gizmodo.com/blackberry-boss-has-a-meltdown-as-he-asks-why-people-ar-5791136 After…

Privacy & Security Kat Hannaford

Cessna Begins Research On “Magic Skin” Condom for Future Airplanes

Sometime in the future, perhaps 2030-2035, you or your spawn will be spirited across the skies in airplanes that are wrapped in a magic, protective condom. The reason for this sensitive sheath will be to better protect the craft from lightning strikes and electromagnetic interference, the latter of which will be handy for all the…

Privacy & Security Jack Loftus

Great Timing: Scientists Fine Tune Two-Part Method for Password Protection

Scientists at Max-Planck-Institute for Physics of Complex Systems recently published a paper describing a two-part method to improve password security. One part is all you: Memorize your password. The second is all computer: A stored, “CAPTCHA-like image of a chaotic lattice system” is generated along with it. Of all the days to see this over…

Physics & Chemistry Jack Loftus

TiVo Customer Email List Hacked—Prepare Yourself for Spam (Updated)

Good morning, TiVo owners! I have some bad news, but you’ve no doubt heard about it by now, thanks to the email message partially pasted above. To everyone else: Tivo’s email database has been compromised! According to the TiVo service announcement mailed out yesterday, the breach was thankfully limited to name and email address only.…

Television Jack Loftus

Security expert predicts a future pirate war off the coast of Somalia

Somalian pirate raids, though deadly, are often amateurish. Security guards can usually shake them off with a few carefully-aimed shots, but one expert says that soon this won’t be enough. Get ready for the modern world’s first pirate war. Casey Christie, who works with maritime security consultancy Concept Tactical Worldwide, predicted: Pirates trying to board…

io9 Annalee Newitz

Is Samsung Installing Keyloggers on Laptops?

It seems weird that a company like Samsung would go and install keylogger software on their products, but according to IT expert Mohamed Hassan, he found the software on not one, but two of his brand new Samsung laptops. Here’s what Hassan had to say in an article for NetworkWorld: While setting up a new…

Gadgets Adrian Covert

BP Employee Lost Laptop Containing Personal Data of Oil Spill Victims

Uh oh! During some “routine business travel,” a BP employee managed to lose a laptop which contains the personal data of the thousands of Louisiana residents who filed compensation claims after the Gulf oil spill: BP spokesman Curtis Thomas said the oil giant on Monday mailed out letters to roughly 13,000 people whose data was…

Privacy & Security Rosa Golijan

Privacy Blocker App Confuses Malicious Android Apps with Garbage Code

Android had a slight security snafu the other day, so it’s no real surprise that Privacy Blocker exists. What does it do? Basically, the app scrambles personal data, should a malicious app decide to send it somewhere it doesn’t belong. https://gizmodo.com/google-to-deploy-remote-kill-policy-for-malicious-and-5777875 For instance your phone number, whatever it is, becomes garbage. 5558675309, or something. The…

Tech News Jack Loftus

Microsoft Disables HTTPS for Hotmail Users in Iran, Sudan (Updated)

Governments in Bahrain, Algeria, Syria, Iran and the Sudan are all free to snoop their citizens’ Hotmail accounts today, as Microsoft has inexplicably disabled HTTPS support for Hotmail users in those countries. Equally disturbing is how quickly Microsoft seemingly abandoned the feature (at least in the listed countries, as it is still active in Europe…

Tech News Jack Loftus

A N00b’s Guide to Safer Regime Change

Tech-centric human rights group Access has published a handy primer for those looking to participate in a Middle Eastern or North African revolution (and keep their identities private while at it). You know—those secret police are assholes. The guide could be a huge boon for would-be dissidents who might otherwise be too scared for their…

Privacy & Security Sam Biddle

Do Apple, Google and Microsoft Know Your Every Step? A Handy Chart

Hide Your Data Through Fragmentation, Not Encryption

Why Apple Collects Detailed Location Data from Your iPhone

Top 5 Musical Uses for Your iPhone’s Formerly Secret Location Log

Why Your iPhone Is Secretly Tracking You: A Very Probable Explanation (Updated)

World’s Smallest Vein Sensor Reads Veins for Secure Access to Laptops

If You Complain About the TSA, You’re More Likely to Be Screened by the TSA

Brazilian Police to Wear Glasses That Can Scan Faces to Find Criminals

French Hacker Gets Arrested After Boasting of Devious Crimes on TV

Control Your Logitech Security Cameras from Your iPad

BlackBerry Boss Angrily Storms Out of a BBC Interview

Cessna Begins Research On “Magic Skin” Condom for Future Airplanes

Great Timing: Scientists Fine Tune Two-Part Method for Password Protection

TiVo Customer Email List Hacked—Prepare Yourself for Spam (Updated)

Security expert predicts a future pirate war off the coast of Somalia

Is Samsung Installing Keyloggers on Laptops?

BP Employee Lost Laptop Containing Personal Data of Oil Spill Victims

Privacy Blocker App Confuses Malicious Android Apps with Garbage Code

Microsoft Disables HTTPS for Hotmail Users in Iran, Sudan (Updated)

A N00b’s Guide to Safer Regime Change

Fitbit Versa 4 Drops to a Record Low as Google Makes Another Push into Fitness Smartwatches Following the Pixel Watch

JBL Boombox 4 Speaker Didn’t Stay at Full Price for Long as Amazon’s Spring Sale Pushes It Close to Used Pricing

Final Call: Get NordVPN at $266 Off + Amazon Gift Card (Few Days Left)

C-3PO’s Head From ‘Empire Strikes Back’ Sold for a Cool Million

T-Mobile 5G Home Internet Delivers Fast Speeds, Low Monthly Prices and Cash Back

Trump Says He’ll Sign Order to Pay TSA

Deadpool Will Deface ‘Magic: The Gathering’ Classics for a New Secret Lair

Apple’s Siri Isn’t Just Going to Use One Chatbot. It’s Going to Use All of Them

Sonos Play Review: Call It a Comeback

Sonos Era 100 SL Review: The Cheapest Way Into Wired Sonos Sound

Asus ROG’s Massive Swift OLED Gaming Monitor Epitomizes Excess in the Best Way

The Ikea Varmblixt Smart Lamp Fills a Donut Hole in My Life

Nothing Headphone A vs. Headphone 1: Which Pair of ANC Wireless Headphones Wins?

Asus ROG’s Cetra Open Wireless Gaming Earbuds Might Be Better Than Wearing a Headset

Nintendo’s Talking Flower Is Annoying as Hell. I Love It

Level Lock Pro Review: As Good as a Secret Smart Lock Gets

Let us help find what you are looking for...