privacy

Part of the appeal of Android is its openness, at least compared to iOS. But, let’s face it. Google isn’t running a charity and Android’s direction will always be aligned with Google’s business. There will always be a large hole to be filled as far as a truly open, truly free, truly secure, and truly private phone goes. And Purism, the people behind the more or less successful Librem laptops, is diving into that space with the Librem 5 phone, and it is taking open source communities along for the ride.

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Privacy has unfortunately become almost a commodity these days. It is something that users mostly take for granted, especially in exchange for convenience, and something companies use to barter with each other. Despite that somewhat lax attitude, however, there are times when too much is really too much. As seems to be the case with GO Keyboard, a popular third-party Android keyboard that is reportedly going way above acceptable behavior and even outright violates Google Play rules.

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Experian is being criticized for allowing consumers to get their credit freeze PINs through email after answering questions that mostly involve information already leaked by Equifax and others. The PINs are used to unfreeze one's credit, making it possible to seek loans and other similar things. Many consumers have put a freeze on their credit in light of the massive Equifax data leak.

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Uber's oft-criticized location tracking has been reined in with the arrival iOS 11, with Apple forcing app-makers to give more granular controls over privacy to users. The ride-sharing app always made use of location services on the iPhone to allow drivers to navigate to their pickup, of course, but that proved insufficient for Uber's appetites. In an update in 2016, Uber decided to restrict an existing location privacy option that iPhone users had previously been enjoying.

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A major privacy issue surrounding the website Translate.com has highlighted the need to be careful about which online services you use for sensitive information. Translate.com, as its name suggests, is an online destination where anyone can translate text from one language to another. It recently came to light that Translate has left countless private documents exposed on the Internet.

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Another Equifax portal was found to be negligent in keeping up with security protocol this week. This portal was discovered by Hold Security LLC, which found a new online portal for Equifax employees to manage credit report disputes (with personal info inside). This portal was guarded only by a single name/password digital doorway whose name and password were both "admin".

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The US isn't just being rocked by disastrous hurricanes, it also beset by what is probably the biggest and most disturbing hacking incident in its history. How big? Nearly half of the country's entire population has had their private information stolen from under Equifax's nose. At that scale, it's not surprising that lawsuits are being thrown at it like a Game of Thrones battle scene. But it seems that not only is Equifax pointing the finger at possibly unrelated parties, it might also be prepping to make a profit out of its own "cybersecurity incident".

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It’s hard, but not impossible, to escape Google these days. From Android phones, to the Chrome browser, to Google Search, to Gmail, almost everything that comes into our digital lives has a trace of Google, one way or another. That also means that it is ultimately harder to escape Google’s tracking systems, especially when it’s hard to see what Google is tracking, much less stop it. Google released a variety of functionality on its Google Dashboard for that very purpose (and to fend off complaints and lawsuits), and it is now making it even easier to use that Dashboard on mobile devices.

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Equifax members sought information today after the credit reporting firm revealed an unprecedented company-wide security breach. There are approximately 323.1 million people in the United States according to the United State Census Bureau's 2016 census. Equifax announced that their cybersecurity incident (read: hack) impacted approximately 143 million US-based users.

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Over the past several weeks I've been using the FlexSafe portable safe whenever my family heads to the beach. The FlexSafe is a tiny three-digit code-locking pack for valuable items, made to keep items safe whilst traveling. The FlexSafe is designed in a way that lends itself well to attaching to a bar - or a chair arm - or any one of a wide variety of larger items. It's made to lock down.

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Uber is putting an end to a controversial practice that involved tracking its riders for a brief period of time after they left the car. The practice kicked off late last year, and though users could disable the functionality if they preferred, many customers were unaware that the tracking was taking place. Concerns over user privacy even prompted a letter from a US senator.

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AccuWeather was just caught sending GPS coordinates, Bluetooth switch, and BSSID of local Wi-Fi routers to a third party. Granting this app access to location information on an iPhone has been found to send several pieces of information to data monetization group Reveal Mobile. While AccuWeather has an extremely large userbase with a strong rating on the Apple App Store, its innards seem to be doing something of which users aren't fully aware.

UPDATE: AccuWeather and Reveal Mobile have released a joint statement which includes the following: "Despite stories to the contrary from sources not connected to the actual information, if a user opts out of location tracking on AccuWeather, no GPS coordinates are collected or passed without further opt-in permission from the user." Further info can be found at the end of this article.

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