A Review of the Best News of the Week on Identity Management & Web Fraud
Amazon confirms it keeps your Alexa recordings basically forever (Ars, Jul 03 2019)
The recordings, and their transcripts, never expire automatically.
A Second U.S. City Has Banned Facial Recognition (VICE, Jun 27 2019)
Somerville, which neighbors Cambridge, Massachusetts, just joined San Francisco in banning the use of facial recognition.
Mozilla’s bizarre robo-surfer project demonstrates ad snooping (Naked Security – Sophos, Jun 28 2019)
In an effort to show you how advertisers snoop on your surfing activity, Mozilla is offering you the chance to pretend that you’re someone else.
One of My Favorite Things
Since I started this curated newsletter in June 2017, I’ve clipped ~10,000 articles and narrowed them down into the best 20 per day & best 15 per week. This is my favorite way to cut through all the security marketing and hype. If you’re enjoying it, tell a friend. If you hate it, tell an enemy.
Thanks! – Lucas Samaras
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Consumers believe privacy is not possible, leading to a change in online behavior (Help Net Security, Jun 28 2019)
82% of online users in the US and 75% in the UK are choosing to change the way they behave online, according to a new consumer survey by FigLeaf. For these respondents, 74% say they are sharing less information online as a result. As for the 25% who indicated that recent privacy scandals had no impact on their online behavior, the prevailing reasons were that they were already highly protective of their information…
Researchers crack open Facebook campaign that pushed malware for years (Ars Technica, Jul 01 2019)
Facebook removes pages following discovery of a campaign that hid in plain sight.
The art and science of password hashing (Help Net Security, Jul 02 2019)
To protect passwords further, some random characters, called salts, are added to the end of the user’s password, therefore producing a completely different hashing output.
Hong Kong protesters fear gov’t use of facial recognition, surveillance tech (SC Magazine, Jul 02 2019)
Fear that the government will draw facial recognition technology from its arsenal of digital surveillance tools to identify protesters in Hong Kong has prompted some to take evasive action to diminish or eliminate their digital footprints. Some protesters are deleting posts on social media as well as shutting off their phones’ location tracking features…
I Opted Out of Facial Recognition at the Airport—It Wasn’t Easy (Wired, Jul 02 2019)
Opinion: We’ve been assured that facial recognition technology is secure, reliable, and accurate. That’s far from certain.
How GDPR Teaches Us to Take a Bottom-Up Approach to Privacy (Dark Reading:, Jun 28 2019)
Looking at underlying security needs means organizations are more likely to be in compliance with privacy regulations.
Data Mapping & Discovery Tools Top Privacy Shopping Lists (Infosecurity Magazine, Jun 28 2019)
Data mapping and discovery tools top privacy purchase plans
Police Body Cam Company Says it Won’t Use Facial Recognition (For Now) (VICE, Jun 27 2019)
Police body camera company Axon announced that it will not be deploying facial recognition in its products, for now, due to “ethical concerns.”
Priorities IT pros follow to ensure ingrained privacy and compliance (Help Net Security, Jul 01 2019)
Data mapping, data discovery, assessment management, and individual rights are top growing privacy tool categories: The top purchase plans for the next twelve months include Data Mapping / Flow (24%), Data Discovery (23%), Assessment Management (20%) and DSAR / Individual Rights (18%).
Crave that Instagram verified badge? Don’t fall for this login-stealing scam (Naked Security – Sophos, Jul 01 2019)
It’s yet another way to trick Instagram users out of their login credentials. Don’t fall for it, lest your account be hijacked!
Serious Security: Beware eBay scrapers promising to help you (Naked Security – Sophos, Jul 03 2019)
Selling items online? Watch our for people who suddenly offer to help!