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Privacy advocates want regulation of behavioral advertising

by Shanmuga

"The targeted Internet advertising phenomenon is viewed with growing concern by privacy advocates who fear that controversial practices like behavioral tracking are ripe for abuse. A coalition of consumer and Internet rights groups have written a joint open letter addressed to the House Committee on Energy and Commerce in which they articulate some specific concerns

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Public Search Engines Mine Private Facebook Details

by Shanmuga

"Researchers from the U.K.’s University of Cambridge recently published a paper detailing a project in which they developed a software tool to correlate and map Facebook profiles they found via public search engines, such as Google, to build detailed maps of relationships among Facebook members.

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Big websites urged to avoid Phorm

by Shanmuga

"Seven of the UK’s biggest web firms have been urged to opt out of a controversial ad-serving system. Phorm – aka Webwise – profiles users’ browsing habits and serves up adverts based on which sites they visit.

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LinkedIn Privacy Settings: What You Need to Know

by Shanmuga

"Since LinkedIn doesn’t require you to share the same types of personal information as you do on Facebook, the service’s privacy settings appear to be much more straightforward than its less business-oriented competitor. But if you leave the default settings in place, you might be surprised to know what information you make public on LinkedIn.

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Privacy group to FTC: Google’s cloud is unsafe

by Shanmuga

"A Washington-based privacy group wants the Federal Trade Commission to launch an investigation of the cloud-computing services offered by Google – including Gmail, Google Docs, Google Calendar and others – to ensure that they are as secure as Google promises they will be.

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Anonymity and Privacy Should Not Add Up to Prison Time

by Shanmuga

"Under current rules, a criminal defendant can get additional time added to a prison sentence if he used "sophisticated means" to commit the offense. In its testimony before the commission, EFF will argue that sentencing courts should not assume that using proxies — technologies that can anonymize users or mask their location — is a

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Google’s Behavioral Ad Targeting: How to Reclaim Control

by Shanmuga

"The advertising system, announced at the Official Google Blog on Wednesday, increases Google’s level of advertising customization. The company’s AdSense network (which generates the ads within Google Search, Gmail, and other Google properties) had already been selecting ads based on your current activity: If you searched for "video card," for example, the ads on the

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Many See Privacy on Web as Big Issue, Survey Says

by Shanmuga

"More than 90 percent of respondents called online privacy a “really” or “somewhat” important issue, according to the survey of more than 1,000 Americans conducted by TRUSTe, an organization that monitors the privacy practices of Web sites of companies like I.B.M., Yahoo and WebMD for a fee.

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UK ISPs to log all emails for 12 months

by Shanmuga

"New rules set to come into force in March will require all Internet Service Providers (ISPs) to keep information about every e-mail sent or received in the UK for a year. As the day grows closer so the opposition becomes more vocal.

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How to Secure Laptops from Prying Eyes

by Shanmuga

"On April 21, 2008, the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals essentially gave the U.S. government carte blanche permission to check any and every piece of data on laptops belonging to travelers passing into the United States at border control checkpoints.

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Firefox 3.1 passes major milestone

by Shanmuga

"Mozilla has completed work on its private browsing mode, the feature the organisation delayed the launch of 3.1 to implement. Private browsing mode allows users to surf the web without leaving any traces of their session on the computer. The company was initially reluctant to include the feature, putting it on hold for four years.

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Google cuts data retention period again

by Shanmuga

"last year, it bowed to pressure from the EU and shaved six months off its retention of identity information. In a further move to avert potential legislation, Google announced yesterday that it would cut the figure in half: IP addresses in its logs will now be anonymized after nine months.

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Google Chrome: Security and Privacy Implications

by Shanmuga

Google’s new browser named Chrome and released as a beta version is drawing flak for its (non)implementation of browser security and privacy.

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Privacy: Microsoft slams Google on privacy

by Shanmuga

""Google’s a great company, got some great products, but you know in some respects I think Google is where Microsoft was 7 or 10 years ago," Peter Cullen, Microsoft’s chief privacy strategist told CNET News sister site ZDNet Australia.

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Internet Explorer 8 to get privacy features

by Shanmuga

"Microsoft on Monday described some new privacy features that will come with IE8, the next release of its browser. The features are designed to make it easier for people to delete and control information about their Web browsing history.

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Privacy: Web Privacy on the Radar in Congress

by Shanmuga

"As advertisers become more sophisticated about behavioral targeting, and online privacy standards become increasingly varied, regulators and privacy advocates are becoming concerned. A few companies have taken precautionary measures to try to fend off criticism; in the last few days, for instance, both Yahoo and Google have made it easier for people to opt out

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Privacy: Google Says IP Addresses Aren’t Personal

by Shanmuga

"Google has responded to European regulators who have suggested that Internet Protocol addresses of users be considered personally identifiable information. Not surprisingly, it disagrees.

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How Internet Censorship Works

by Shanmuga

"One of the early nicknames for the Internet was the "information superhighway" because it was supposed to provide the average person with fast access to a practically limitless amount of data. For many users, that’s exactly what accessing the Internet is like. For others, it’s as if the information superhighway has some major roadblocks in

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Privacy groups vow to fight Microsoft-Yahoo deal

by Shanmuga

"Privacy groups are promising a fight before U.S. regulatory agencies if Microsoft’s offer to buy Yahoo for $44.6 billion is accepted, and the deal could face significant hurdles in Europe as well. Microsoft announced that it sent an offer to Yahoo’s board of directors last Thursday, going public with the news Friday morning. Immediately, the

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Privacy: IP addresses could become “personal information” in Europe

by Shanmuga

"Could IP addresses soon be considered "personal information" in Europe? The question was discussed yesterday at a hearing before the European Parliament’s Civil Liberties Committee, where European data protection authorities and privacy advocates backed the idea. Google, not surprisingly, wasn’t as thrilled.

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Privacy: Facebook faces privacy questions

by Shanmuga

"Facebook is to be quizzed about its data protection policies by the Information Commissioner’s Office. The investigation follows a complaint by a user of the social network who was unable to fully delete their profile even after terminating their account. Currently, personal information remains on Facebook’s servers even after a user deactivates an account.

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