Privacy

Beginning next week, the FTC will hold a series of public roundtables covering the growing number of challenges to consumer privacy on the Internet. Dubbed "Exploring Privacy," the daylong discussions will focus on "the collection and use of information by retailers, data brokers, third-party applications, and other diverse businesses." Hold that yawn. Behavioral tracking and ad targeting have everything to do with the pesky "Warning!" popup blinking behind your browser window right now. The ones that could shatter your online privacy.

A senior military analyst with the New York-based Human Rights Watch has been suspended while the organisation investigates his internet postings about his hobby of collecting Nazi and other war memorabilia.

Tom Porteous, the London director of Human Rights Watch, says that the group is looking at Marc Garlasco’s blogs to see if there are any inconsistent remarks that might bring the organisation into disrepute.

Facebook was built as a powerful social connector, allowing users to befriend others with similar interests, locations, schools, and more. But as privacy concerns mount and users demand more protection, the social networking site's philosophy has started to go down the toilet. Now that Facebook is eliminating regional networks -- or groupings of people based on where they live -- it's becoming apparent that proclivities lean towards building fences rather than crossing them.

A report by Credant Technologies found that Londoners leave around 10,000 mobile phones a month in the back of taxis, and more than 1,000 other handheld devices, including iPods, laptops and memory sticks.

Many of these devices now have the capacity to store as much as 4,000 pictures, 20,000 Word documents, 200,000 emails or an amazing 500,000 contact files, making them an obvious target for identity theft criminals and hackers who can – and do - steal this information and then assume the identity of the user both in their personal and business life.

The holiday season is almost here, and even in a recession huge numbers of people will likely be shopping online for gifts this year.

The rush by shoppers to the Web makes the season a great time for online retailers. It's also a great time for hackers looking to steal data and money from the unwary millions expected to search for great deals online.

A team of unidentified hackers has managed to steal "confidential" global warming data after breaking into the e-mail server of a prominent, British climate-research center and posted them online - showing that climate scientists conspired to overstate that man has caused climate change.

Neemia Tialata and Cory Jane can expect a talking to from All Blacks coach Graham Henry after revealing on the social networking site Twitter they had been left out of the New Zealand to play England this weekend.

The pair published the news they were being rested more than 24 hours before Henry formally announced his lineup on Wednesday.

Google has been seriously challenged by several EU countries ( such as Germany,Greece and now Switzerland ) as to its claims that it is within its legal rights re privacy infrigements via Street View and other related services .

In the light of mounting abuse of GPS data via serious hackers ( even institutional spy networks ) it is hardly any wonder that EU has taken a tougher stand ( compared to USA ) regarding data protection regulations and laws even for private individuals.

Ever wonder exactly what Google knows about you?

Google today took a step to help answer that question with the unveiling of Google Dashboard, which is designed to let users see and control the extensive amount of data that Google has stored in its servers about them.

It seems that something has gone horribly wrong at the HQ of play.com over the past few hours, if the word of BW reader Wout is anything to go by.

He’s been having problems getting to speak to any of their customer service reps and reports that the line cuts off after about four minutes, regardless of whether you’ve actually been able to speak to anyone or not.