Privacy

"We are in a constant dialogue with Internet search engines, ranging from the mundane to the confessional. We ask search engines everything: What movies are playing (and which are worth seeing)? Where’s the nearest clinic (and how do I get there)? Who’s running in the sheriff’s race (and what are their views)? These online queries can give insight into our private details and innermost thoughts, but police increasingly access them without adhering to longstanding limits on government investigative power.

A Virginia appeals court is poised to review such a request in a case called Commonwealth v. Clements. In Clements, police sought evidence under a “reverse-keyword warrant,” a novel court order that compels search engines like Google to hand over information about every person who has looked up a word or phrase online. While the trial judge correctly recognized the privacy interest in our Internet queries, he overlooked the other wide-ranging harms that keyword warrants enable and upheld the search.

But as EFF and the ACLU explained in our amicus brief on appeal, reverse keyword warrants simply cannot be conducted in a lawful way. They invert privacy protections, threaten free speech and inquiry, and fundamentally conflict with the principles underlying the Fourth Amendment and its analog in the Virginia Constitution. The court of appeals now has a chance to say so and protect the rights of Internet users well beyond state lines."

https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2025/07/eff-tells-virginia-court-constitutional-privacy-protections-forbid-cops-finding

#USA #Virginia #Privacy #KeywordWarrant #SearchEngines

Washington state Department of LIcensing is sharing drivers' private data with ICE

That's bad!

"KING 5 investigation has uncovered that a state agency, the Department of Licensing (DOL), is providing Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) and other Homeland Security departments with access to private driver's license and vehicle information.

State law prohibits local agencies from sharing personal data with the federal government for deportation purposes. Despite past controversies, the KING 5 Investigators have found that DOL quietly reopened accounts with ICE [in 2018], Border Patrol, and other Homeland Security entities — leading to a dramatic surge in data searches since the election of President Donald Trump.

State Senator Rebecca Saldaña, a sponsor of the 2018 "Keep Washington Working Act" which cemented into law that state agencies are not to cooperate with federal programs targeting residents based on immigration or citizenship, says DOL's actions go against the intent of the law. "

https://www.king5.com/article/news/investigations/investigators/exclusive-washington-state-agency-department-licensing-shares-private-driver-data-with-ice/281-910b35d8-e1fd-4b30-9ceb-00e6708f3b24

#privacy #immigration #wa

Can an ‘ethical’ #spyware maker justify providing its tech to #ICE?

https://techcrunch.com/2025/07/11/can-an-ethical-spyware-maker-provide-its-tech-to-ice/

#privacy #cybersecurity #Paragon #politics

#Tradecraft in the Information Age

https://www.schneier.com/blog/archives/2025/07/tradecraft-in-the-information-age.html

#spies #surveillance #privacy #espionage

#German court rules #Meta tracking technology violates European #privacy laws

https://therecord.media/german-court-meta-tracking-tech

#Europe #politics

"The future of TikTok matters more than you might think. TikTok itself reports that more than 170 million Americans and 7.5 million U.S. businesses use the app. Pew Research Center estimates that nearly 60 percent of adults under 30 are on TikTok, and more than 50 percent of those users consider it their primary source for news.

Beyond the sheer reach of its userbase, an Oxford Economics report commissioned by TikTok found that in 2023, the app generated more than $24 billion in gross domestic product (GDP) and created more than 224,000 jobs in the U.S. alone.

In a recent interview with content creator Jessica Hawk, we spoke about her strategy for transitioning to other platforms, the ripple effects of a potential TikTok ban on brand partnerships and income streams, and how the creator economy might shift. While the fate of an app many young people use to share videos of themselves dancing may seem trivial, for the millions of people and businesses across the U.S. relying on the platform to make a living, the stakes are incalculable.

Outside of the detrimental impact that a TikTok ban would have on the livelihoods of its users, there is also much to be said about how PAFACA’s ultimatum perpetuates the global shift away from an open internet. As recent New America Technology and Democracy Fellow Tianyu Fang observed in New America’s The Thread, the internet has become “less open globally” in recent years due to the actions of both authoritarian governments and democracies.

Just as the Founding Fathers emphasized the importance of a separation of church and state, ensuring a separation between our government and Big Tech will be crucial to defending democracy—both nationally and globally—for years to come. TikTok is only the beginning."

https://www.newamerica.org/oti/blog/the-tiktok-ban-was-never-just-about-tiktok/

#SocialMedia #USA #TikTok #Censorship #DataProtection #Privacy

#Qantas confirms #DataBreach impacts 5.7 million customers

https://www.bleepingcomputer.com/news/security/qantas-confirms-data-breach-impacts-57-million-customers/

#privacy #cybersecurity #travel #airline

Using #Signal groups for #activism

https://micahflee.com/using-signal-groups-for-activism/

#privacy #politics

#ICE Is Searching a Massive #Insurance and #MedicalBill Database to Find Deportation Targets

https://www.404media.co/ice-is-searching-a-massive-insurance-and-medical-bill-database-to-find-deportation-targets/

#privacy #healthcare #politics

#BitcoinDepot breach exposes data of nearly 27,000 #crypto users

https://www.bleepingcomputer.com/news/security/bitcoin-depot-breach-exposes-data-of-nearly-27-000-crypto-users/

#privacy #cybersecurity #DataBreach

Browser-Erweiterungen machen fast 1 Mio. Browser zu Website-Scraping-Bots.

👉 Liste der betroffenen Add-ons: https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/e/2PACX-1vT1XgBs25gRlg5e3nYCAff967WMtZZTO-TB3rR9zszaJpTpCVFg8j7FkBxnHb3tw3aHGjKBGSxYyLgV/pubhtml

#BrowserSecurity #Privacy #Infosec #Security #Sicherheit #Firefox #Chrome

/kuk

Swedish PM’s private address revealed by #Strava data shared by bodyguards

https://www.theguardian.com/world/2025/jul/08/swedish-pm-safety-strava-data-bodyguards-ulf-kristersson-running-cycling-routes

#Sweden #privacy

"DeepSeek could soon disappear from Apple and Google's official app stores in Germany as data protection officials accuse the Chinese chatbot of alleged privacy violations.

"DeepSeek's transfer of user data to China is unlawful," said Berlin Data Protection Commissioner Meike Kamp, in an official announcement dated June 27, 2025. Kamp has called on the Big Tech giant to consider blocking the app in the country.

Another EU member, Italy, already banned Deepseek from the Apple App Store and Google Play Store in January 2025 over similar grounds. The block was enforced about a week after the release of the ChatGPT rival.

According to German authorities, the company behind DeepSeek AI (Hangzhou DeepSeek Artificial Intelligence Co., Ltd) violates Art. 46 (1) of the GDPR, which rules the need for "appropriate safeguards" when transferring EU citizens' personal data to a third country.

According to Kamp, DeepSeek failed to convince German officials that users' data is protected when these details are transferred to China, as expected by EU laws."

https://www.techradar.com/computing/cyber-security/deepseek-faces-ban-in-germany-as-privacy-watchdog-reports-the-app-to-google-and-apple-as-illegal-content

#EU #Germany #AI #GenerativeAI #DeepSeek #DataProtection #GDPR #Privacy #China

"In selling law enforcement agencies bulk access to such sensitive information, these airlines—through their data broker—are putting their own profits over travelers' privacy. U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) recently detailed its own purchase of personal data from ARC. In the current climate, this can have a detrimental impact on people’s lives.

Movement unrestricted by governments is a hallmark of a free society. In our current moment, when the federal government is threatening legal consequences based on people’s national, religious, and political affiliations, having air travel in and out of the United States tracked by any ARC customer is a recipe for state retribution.

Sadly, data brokers are doing even broader harm to our privacy. Sensitive location data is harvested from smartphones and sold to cops, internet backbone data is sold to federal counterintelligence agencies, and utility databases containing phone, water, and electricity records are shared with ICE officers."

https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2025/07/data-brokers-are-selling-your-flight-information-cbp-and-ice

#USA #Surveillance #PoliceState #ICE #CBP #DataBrokers #Privacy

ICYMI: @BruceByfield@wandering.shop examines uBlock Origin, a browser extension for online privacy and security
https://www.linux-magazine.com/Online/Features/An-Essential-Extension-for-Any-User
#privacy #security #browser #uBO #extension #AdBlocker

Cops in #Catalonia think everyone using a #Google #Pixel must be a drug dealer

https://www.androidauthority.com/google-pixel-organized-crime-preferred-phone-3573578/

#privacy #cybersecurity #politics #Android #GrapheneOS

GrapheneOS version 2025070800 released:

https://grapheneos.org/releases#2025070800

See the linked release notes for a summary of the improvements over the previous release.

Forum discussion thread:

https://discuss.grapheneos.org/d/23811-grapheneos-version-2025070800-released

#GrapheneOS #privacy #security

Marks & Spencer chair refuses to say if retailer paid hackers after #ransomware attack

https://techcrunch.com/2025/07/08/marks-spencer-chair-refuses-to-say-if-retailer-paid-hackers-after-ransomware-attack/

#MarksAndSpencer #retail #UK #privacy #cybersecurity #DataBreach

A Marco #Rubio impostor is using #AI voice to call high-level officials

https://www.washingtonpost.com/national-security/2025/07/08/marco-rubio-ai-imposter-signal/

#deepfake #privacy #cybersecurity

#EFF to US Court of Appeals: Protect Taxpayer #Privacy

https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2025/07/eff-us-court-appeals-protect-taxpayer-privacy

#taxes #politics

#JackDorsey launches a #WhatsApp messaging rival built on #Bluetooth

https://www.cnbc.com/2025/07/07/jack-dorsey-whatsapp-bluetooth.html

#Bitchat #FOSS #privacy #cybersecurity

PRIVACY IS DEMOCRACY.

That's why all these Western democracies are gearing up their surveillance states.

#surveillance #democracy #privacy #VanWeel

GrapheneOS version 2025070700 released:

https://grapheneos.org/releases#2025070700

See the linked release notes for a summary of the improvements over the previous release.

Forum discussion thread:

https://discuss.grapheneos.org/d/23779-grapheneos-version-2025070700-released

#GrapheneOS #privacy #security

Introducing #Session Pro Beta: Supporting the Network, Unlocking New Features

https://getsession.org/blog/session-pro-beta

#privacy #cybersecurity #FOSS #decentralization

#Fubo pays $3.4M to settle claims it illegally shared user data with advertisers

https://arstechnica.com/gadgets/2025/07/fubo-pays-3-4m-to-settle-claims-it-illegally-shared-user-data-with-advertisers/

#privacy #streaming