Source: xkcd: Customer Rewards

Facebook granted a select group of companies special access to its users’ records even after the point in 2015 that the company has claimed it stopped sharing such data with app developers. According to the Wall Street Journal, which cited court documents, unnamed Facebook officials and other unnamed sources, Facebook made special agreements with certain companies called “whitelists,” Read more about Facebook gave some companies special access to data on users’ friends[…]

about 14 million people were affected by a bug that, for a nine-day span between May 18 and 27, caused profile posts to be set as public by default, allowing any Tom, Dick or Harriet to view the material. “We recently found a bug that automatically suggested posting publicly when some people were creating their Read more about The hits keep coming for Facebook: Web giant made 14m people’s private posts public[…]

It’s time to break out your “Alexa, I Told You So” banners – because a Portland, Oregon, couple received a phone call from one of the husband’s employees earlier this month, telling them she had just received a recording of them talking privately in their home. “Unplug your Alexa devices right now,” the staffer told Read more about You know that silly fear about Alexa recording everything and leaking it online? It just happened[…]

Google is being sued in the high court for as much as £3.2bn for the alleged “clandestine tracking and collation” of personal information from 4.4 million iPhone users in the UK. The collective action is being led by former Which? director Richard Lloyd over claims Google bypassed the privacy settings of Apple’s Safari browser on Read more about Google sued for ‘clandestine tracking’ of 4.4m UK iPhone users’ browsing data[…]

At least one server used by an app for parents to monitor their teenagers’ phone activity has leaked tens of thousands of accounts of both parents and children. The mobile app, TeenSafe, bills itself as a “secure” monitoring app for iOS and Android, which lets parents view their child’s text messages and location, monitor who Read more about Teensafe spying app leaked thousands of user passwords[…]

LocationSmart, a U.S. based company that acts as an aggregator of real-time data about the precise location of mobile phone devices, has been leaking this information to anyone via a buggy component of its Web site — without the need for any password or other form of authentication or authorization — KrebsOnSecurity has learned. The Read more about Tracking Firm LocationSmart Leaked Location Data for Customers of All Major U.S. Mobile Carriers Without Consent in Real Time Via Its Web Site[…]

As face recognition in public places becomes more commonplace, Big Brother Watch is especially concerned with false identification. In May, South Wales Police revealed that its face-recognition software had erroneously flagged thousands of attendees of a soccer game as a match for criminals; 92 percent of the matches were wrong. In a statement to the Read more about UK Watchdog Calls for Face Recognition Ban Over 90 Percent False-Positive Rate[…]

Facebook’s apology-and-explanation machine grinds on, with The Social Network™ posting detail on one of its most controversial activities – how it tracks people who don’t use Facebook. The company explained that the post is a partial response to questions CEO Mark Zuckerberg was unable to answer during his senate and Congressional hearings. It’s no real Read more about Facebook admits it does track non-users, for their own good[…]

Plenty of people have voluntarily uploaded their DNA to GEDmatch and other databases, often with real names and contact information. It’s what you do if you’re an adopted kid looking for a long-lost parent, or a genealogy buff curious about whether you have any cousins still living in the old country. GEDmatch requires that you Read more about The Golden State Killer Suspect’s DNA Was in a Publicly Available Database, and Yours Might Be Too[…]

Chinese authorities revealed over the weekend that they have the capability of retrieving deleted messages from the almost universally used WeChat app. The admission doesn’t come as a surprise to many, but it’s rare for this type of questionable data collection tactic to be acknowledged publicly.As noted by the South China Morning Post, an anti-corruption Read more about Chinese government admits collection of deleted WeChat messages[…]

The Whois public database of domain name registration details is dead. In a letter [PDF] sent this week to DNS overseer ICANN, Europe’s data protection authorities have effectively killed off the current service, noting that it breaks the law and so will be illegal come 25 May, when GDPR comes into force. The letter also Read more about Whois is dead as Europe hands DNS overlord ICANN its arse 🙁[…]

In 2004, one of the world’s most popular social networks, Orkut, was founded by a former Google employee named Orkut Büyükkökten. Later that year, a Harvard University student named Mark Zuckerberg launched ‘the Facebook’, which over the course of a year became ubiquitous in Ivy League universities and was eventually called Facebook.com. Orkut was shut Read more about Orkut Hello: The Man Behind Orkut Says His ‘Hello’ Platform Doesn’t Sell User Data[…]

Facebook has admitted that some apps had access to users’ private messages, thanks to a policy that allowed devs to request mailbox permissions. The revelation came as current Facebook users found out whether they or their friends had used the “This Is Your Digital Life” app that allowed academic Aleksandr Kogan to collect data on Read more about Facebook admits: Apps were given users’ permission to go into their inboxes[…]

Facebook launched a tool yesterday that you can use to find out whether you or your friends shared information with Cambridge Analytica, the Trump-affiliated company that harvested data from a Facebook app to support the then-candidate’s efforts in the 2016 presidential election. If you were affected directly—and you have plenty of company, if so—you should Read more about How to Check if Cambridge Analytica Had Your Facebook Data[…]

Facebook is suspending a data analytics firm called CubeYou from the platform after CNBC notified the company that CubeYou was collecting information about users through quizzes. CubeYou misleadingly labeled its quizzes “for non-profit academic research,” then shared user information with marketers. The scenario is eerily similar to how Cambridge Analytica received unauthorized access to data Read more about CubeYou: Cambridge-like app collected data on millions from Facebook[…]

A website that allowed Gindr’s gay-dating app users to see who blocked them on the service says that by using the company’s API it was able to view unread messages, email addresses, deleted photos, and—perhaps most troubling—location data, according to a report published Wednesday. The website, C*ckblocked, boasts of being the “first and only way Read more about Grindr’s API Surrendered Location Data to a Third-Party Website—Even After Users Opted Out[…]

This extension helps you control more of your web activity from Facebook by isolating your identity into a separate container. This makes it harder for Facebook to track your activity on other websites via third-party cookies. Rather than stop using a service you find valuable and miss out on those adorable photos of your nephew, Read more about Mozilla launches Facebook container extension[…]

During an appearance before a committee of U.K. lawmakers today, Cambridge Analytica whistleblower Christopher Wylie breathed new life into longstanding rumors that the Facebook app listens to its users in order to target advertisements.Damian Collins, a member of parliament who chaired the committee, asked whether the Facebook app might listen to what users are discussing Read more about Wylie: It’s possible that the Facebook app is listening to you[…]

Basically not only will they allow a huge amount of different agencies to tap your internet and phone and store it without any judicary procedures, checks or balances, they will also allow these agencies to share the data with whoever they want, including foreign agencies. Surprisingly the Dutch people voted against these far reaching breaches Read more about Dutch government pretends to think about referendum result against big brother unlimited surveillance, ignores it completely.[…]

Did you ever record a video on Facebook to post directly to your friend’s wall, only to discard the take and film a new version? You may have thought those embarrassing draft versions were deleted, but Facebook kept a copy. The company is blaming it on a “bug” and swears that it’s going to delete Read more about Facebook Blames a ‘Bug’ for Not Deleting Your Seemingly Deleted Videos[…]

NEW DELHI — Seeking to build an identification system of unprecedented scope, India is scanning the fingerprints, eyes and faces of its 1.3 billion residents and connecting the data to everything from welfare benefits to mobile phones. Civil libertarians are horrified, viewing the program, called Aadhaar, as Orwell’s Big Brother brought to life. To the Read more about ‘Big Brother’ in India Requires Fingerprint Scans for Food, Phones and Finances[…]

Hookup fixer Grindr is on the defensive after it shared sensitive information, including HIV status and physical location, of its app’s users with outside organizations. The quickie booking facilitator on Monday admitted it passed, via HTTPS, people’s public profiles to third-party analytics companies to process on its behalf. That means, yes, the information was handed Read more about Grindr: Yeah, we shared your HIV status info with other companies – but we didn’t charge them! (oh and your GPS coords)[…]