Facebook’s founder and chief executive Mark Zuckerberg faced two days of grilling before US politicians, in April 2018, following concerns over how his company deals with people’s data.
There are several flow-on effects from the recent Facebook hack. Any accounts on other platforms that use Facebook verification are also at risk. That’s because it’s now a common practice to use one account as an automatic verification to connect to other platforms. This is known as single sign-on (SSO).
I recently predicted that health data from electronic sources could soon be compiled into a health or wellness report and shared with insurance companies to help them determine who they’ll cover.
- By John Torpey
The Trump administration is denying passports to U.S. citizens who live in Texas near the U.S.-Mexico border, according to news reports.
The administration is accusing applicants of having inadequate documentation of their birth on U.S. soil, and refusing to issue them passports on that basis.
- By Leah Kardos
It is no coincidence that two of Aretha Franklin’s celebrated contemporaries who travelled to Detroit to see the singer in the last stages of her illness were Stevie Wonder and Jesse Jackson. It is hard to overestimate Franklin’s importance to both music and the civil rights movement – and the presence of one of music’s greatest figures alongside Martin Luther King Jr’s right-hand man at her bedside in the final days of her life is a fitting tribute to one of the true greats of Black American culture.
- By Nermin Allam
Earlier this summer, Saudi Arabia lifted the decades-long ban on women’s driving. The move is part of a series of reforms that the country has been implementing.
Recent high-profile media coverage has prompted public recognition that cannabis in particular forms can have beneficial medical effects for some conditions such as epilepsy.
- By Stacey Wood
If you have a mailbox, you probably get junk mail. If you have an email account, you probably get spam. If you have a phone, you probably get robocalls.
The smart device market is exploding. Smart home kits for retrofitting “non-smart” houses have become cheaper.
As we increasingly use social media platforms such as Facebook, Twitter, Instagram and WhatsApp to communicate with each other, many of us are unaware of the ways in which our posts might later resurface – and get us into trouble with the law.
- By Joe Burton
Imagine if a hacker shut down the baggage handling system of one of the world’s busiest airports.
Since President Donald Trump ordered border officials to criminally prosecute all people caught trying to cross the U.S.-Mexico border in May, approximately 2,000 children of Central American migrants have been forcibly separated from their parents.
We need a simple system for categorising data privacy settings, similar to the way Creative Commons specifies how work can be legally shared.
California law enforcement announced the possible capture of a long-sought serial killer. Shortly after, it was reported that police had used public DNA databases to determine his identity.
Whether or not you realise or consent to it, big data can affect you and how you live your life. The data we create when using social media, browsing the internet and wearing fitness trackers are all collected, categorised and used by businesses and the state to create profiles of us.
“Doxxing” is an old internet term that comes from the idea of collecting the documents, or “docs,” on a person. The effort to discover and reveal personal information, of course, long predates the internet. It’s worrying, and potentially dangerous, when someone peels back the curtain of another’s identity.
In late April, the top federal cybersecurity agency, US-CERT, announced that Russian hackers had attacked internet-connected devices throughout the U.S., including network routers in private homes.
As concerns about privacy increase for people using mobile apps, new research suggests that trust and engagement may hinge on perceptions about how the app uses personal data and whether it seeks user input before delivering services.
As a scholar of the social and political implications of technology, I would argue the internet is designed to be hostile to the people who use it. I call it a “hostile information architecture.”
Every time you open an app, click a link, like a post, read an article, hover over an ad, or connect to someone, you are generating data.
I am an immigrant. Many people worry about those like me, and those from other countries who might follow in my footsteps. Bold newspaper headlines either blame immigrants for a whole host of issues or portray them as saintly helpers in the struggle for economic well-being.
The dealings that have been revealed between Cambridge Analytica and Facebook have all the trappings of a Hollywood thriller
At a time when social network privacy is in the news, new research shows there are more ways than previously realized to reveal certain traits we might be trying to conceal.