Paris: "Biggest Invasion of Privacy EVER"

Paris: "Biggest Invasion of Privacy EVER"

from: mtv.news

Paris Hilton is said to be disgusted by the on-going trading of website, www.parisexposed.com.

We reported last week how loads of Paris's personal belongings ended up on the site after a missed payment on a storage locker of hers led to her stuff being put up for public auction.

Now the sometime singer/actress/model has filed a lawsuit damning the creators of the site and the couple who purchased her belongings in the first place.

"I was appalled to learn that people are exploiting mine and my sister's private and personal belongings for commercial gain," she said.

Smart Card Alliance Releases Security, Privacy Guidelines

Article published at PCMAG.COM

The Smart Card Alliance, which represents a plethora of companies and governmental entities with a vested interest in the successful marriage of RFID and technology, has come out with best practice suggestions for companies implementing radio frequency technology in identity management systems.

The goal of the best practice guidelines issued by the Alliance Identity Council—three around security; seven around privacy—is to address concerns, voiced mainly by advocates, about potential citizen protection and rights violations with the use of RFID technology in identification documents.

The questions from security and privacy advocates come at a time of tremendous activity around identification cards and payment systems that utilize RFID technology.

Read the full article

Workshop on Privacy & Data Protection Issues

The European Commission will organise a 13 February workshop on privacy and data protection issues with regards to in-vehicle telematics and cooperative systems.

The workshop’s objective is to discuss how to deal with privacy issues in the design of telematics services and applications.

The agenda will discuss experiences of EC-funded projects in this area and present various case studies. Experts from the industry (vehicle manufacturers, equipment suppliers, telecommunications), security in electronic communications, as well as representatives from data protection authorities will be invited in order to elaborate guidelines for tackling these issues.

Read the agenda: .pdf (59 KB)

Stanford Computer Science

The Stanford University founded in 1965, the Department of Computer Science is a center for research and education at the undergraduate and graduate levels. Strong research groups exist in areas of artificial intelligence, robotics, foundations of computer science, scientific computing, and systems.

SECURITY & PRIVACY PROJECTS

R E S E A R C H G R O U P S

Theory Group

Applied Crypto Group

Security Laboratory
Bio-X

Formal Verification Group

CIS Circuits & Design

InfoLab

Information Privacy

SUIF Compiler Group

Secure Computer Systems

SimOS

Large-scale Interoperation & Composition

Medical Information Science

P R O J E C T S

ACTIVE

APPeers: Cooperative Networked Control of Dynamical Peer-to-Peer Vehicle Systems

Collective: A Computing Utility Architecture

Electronic Voting

Identity Based Encryption

PORTIA: Managing sensitive information in a wired world

Privacy and Databases

PwdHash - Web Password Hashing

Smart Memories

SpoofGuard: Preventing online identity theft and phishing

SPYCE: Software Quality and Infrastructure Protection for Diffuse Computing

TRUST: Team for Research in Ubiquitous Secure Technology

COMPLETE

Agile Management of Dynamic Collaboration

Pleiades: Assurance For Mobile Code

INACTIVE

Authenticating Streamed Data

Electronic Wallets Project: wallets for desktops and handheld devices

Generating RSA keys on the PalmPilot With the Help of an Untrusted Server

Identity Based Encryption Email system

ITTC Project: Intrusion tolerance via threshold cryptography

Security of cryptographic primitives and protocols

SSL Sniffer: a great way to see the SSL protocol in action

SSL WebStones

European Privacy Institute

Source: Cordis News

An initiative has been launched to lobby for a permanent European institute to foster a synthesis between technology and privacy.

The European Privacy Institute Initiative already involves nearly 40 experts - mainly academics but also business associates and an official from the European Commission. Driving the initiative is a desire to examine how values like privacy and ethics can be integrated into future product designs and technologies.

The group points out that a number of global companies, such as IBM, Microsoft and KPMG are conducting research into privacy issues. In Europe, a number of EU-funded projects are doing the same. These include PRIME (Privacy and Identity Management for Europe), FIDIS (Future of Identity in the Information Society), and BITE (Biometric Identification Technology Ethics). Universities around Europe are also carrying out their own research projects.

An Executive Committee has been created to present the idea to the EU institutions. The three Committee members represent a university, the director of a research consortium and the CEO of the European Biometric Forum. A Scientific Advisory Committee has been established to assist the Executive Committee.

Read the full article at Cordis

Now Internet Code to Protect Privacy

Article published at Techtree

Microsoft, Google, Yahoo!, and Vodafone have signed an agreement with online activists, human rights groups, and press freedom groups to draw up an Internet code of conduct to protect free speech and privacy of Web users.

These four companies will together develop a code of conduct with a coalition of nongovernmental organizations (NGOs) to promote freedom of expression and privacy rights.

Besides, they will establish a set of rules that will govern how they deal with censorship and other restrictions on human rights. In a joint statement, the companies said that they aim to come up with a code of conduct by the end of this year that would counter such trends as the increased jailing of Internet journalists, monitoring of legitimate online activity, and censorship.

They would also develop a framework that would hold signatories accountable for their actions in the areas of freedom of expression and privacy rights.

According to a Google spokesman, Google has helped initiate this process as part of their commitment to protecting human rights and privacy of their users around the world. And, they look forward to working with all the parties in an effort to arrive at global principles that can help them protect Internet users in countries that seek to curtail free expression

Read the full article

Reasons for privacy invasion

Text Source:

This is a text from : Location privacy in ubiquitous computing by Alastair R. Beresford.

Computer Laboratory. University of Cambridge

The reasons for privacy invasion are wide and varied. Governments, while wildly varying in political constitution, all demand information from citizens; examples include earnings, family make-up, religion and qualifications (everything from driving ability to medical training). The stated goal of data gathering is that of collective good for society; in many cases the benefit is clear (for example, the regulation of medical practitioners) but in some cases the societal benefits are less obvious, for example, the record of racial origin.


Commercial organisations are primarily concerned with profit, yet companies are often much more invasive than their governmental counterparts. Traditionally, marketing, advertising or brand loyalty have been suggested as the major motivation, but more recently price discrimination-the act of charging individuals a personalised price based on the amount they are prepared to pay-has been suggested as a strong motivating factor.


Odlyzko provides a good introduction to price discrimination and the Internet. Discriminatory pricing works best in markets with large, fixed, up-front costs and low marginal costs. With the centralisation of services and reduced cost of communication, and transportation, more and more industries fit this model. Price discrimination is not a new phenomenon: it was used extensively throughout the early development of the railways in the US and Britain until a customer backlash introduced extensive regulation. Traditionally its use has been limited by the lack of technology to perform detailed customer profiling.

More recent price discrimination examples include flights, computers and even DVDs. The ability to automate the collection and analysis of consumer profiles (often referred to as data mining or data profiling) has greatly enhanced corporations ability to dynamically and differentially price products. Odlyzko uses economic theory to suggest that price discrimination combined with efficient customer profiling results in a more efficient market and thus without regulation its use will become widespread.

Data mining or profiling (whether for marketing, brand loyalty or price discrimination) will have a stark impact on consumer privacy. Not all users appear to be concerned with data collection and retention policies; provided a majority of users are content with such processing, industry-wide practise may force other less content consumers into participating either through lack of any choice or high discriminatory prices for those wishing to retain privacy.

Controlling digital information. . . .

Photo by unapersona

Recent online videos underscore difficulties controlling digital information once set free

By Associated Press Tuesday, January 16, 2007

NEW YORK (AP) -- For evidence that digital information, once set free, cannot be controlled, consider the steamy video of Brazilian supermodel Daniela Cicarelli making out with her boyfriend on a Spanish beach and in the water just off shore.

The couple persuaded a Brazilian court last fall to force the video-sharing site YouTube to remove copies, but other users simply resubmitted the video through their free accounts.
Earlier this month, Internet service providers in Brazil, responding to the judge's order, briefly blocked access to YouTube entirely. But by then other Web sites already had the video, and many in Brazil even had stored personal copies on their computer hard drives.

Safekeeping information -- video, photographs, documents -- will become even tougher with the emergence of additional ''Web 2.0'' services designed for users to easily share data. Society may have good reasons -- such as privacy, security or taste -- for wanting to keep the lid on some types of information, but it only takes one individual to overrule that desire.

Read the full article

US move to protect privacy

President Bush has signed into law new federal legislation seeking to protect traditional, wireless, and Internet phone calling consumers by preventing phone companies from selling their private phone records without customer authorisation, and criminalising attempts to obtain those fraudulently.

The kind of surveillance activities carried out on behalf of computing giant Hewlett-Packard, which caused controversy last year, have been made illegal in the US thanks to a new law

28 January 2007 DATA PROTECTION DAY

A 2003 Eurobarometer survey on the protection of privacy in the European Union showed that 70% of European citizens feel they know little about what is done in their country to protect their personal data.

However, data protection issues are central in citizens’ lives: at work, in their relations with public authorities, in the health field, when they travel or surf the internet. The right to data protection is also the prerequisite for the exercise of other fundamental rights, such as the right to freedom of speech or conscience.

Therefore, in 2007, for the first time, the Council of Europe will be celebrating a Data Protection Day on 28 January. This will be the occasion for European citizens to become more aware of personal data protection and of what their rights and responsibilities are in that regard.

The Encyclopedia of Privacy

"Encyclopedia of Privacy" (in 2 volumes) edited by William G. Staples (Greenwood Press 2007).


The Encyclopedia of Privacy takes a comprehensive look at the issue of privacy in the United States today and throughout history. Edited by William G. Staples, professor and chair of the Department of Sociology at the University of Kansas, the Encyclopedia of Privacy is a useful tool for laypersons and experts alike. Its 226 detailed but accessibly-written entries, authored by over 100 privacy scholars and experts, include topics as general as wiretapping and as specific as Carnivore software. The volumes also provide summaries of key cases, brief biographies of notable personalities, a chronology of major privacy-related events, and a short section on general privacy resources. Each entry also provides a list of resources for further study.

Is Privacy Overrated?

Is Privacy Overrated?

Article published at eMarketer.com


JANUARY 12, 2007

Privacy... or better service? Privacy, better service. Better service!

When e-commerce began, many retailers were wary of infringing on consumers' privacy — and with good reason. Survey after survey showed that privacy and security concerns were the primary reasons many shoppers were hesitant to buy online.

But that was then.

Now the pendulum may be swinging the other way. When asked to balance their privacy concerns with the prospect of better customer service, many online customers are starting to lean toward service.

The new "Personalization Survey" from ChoiceStream shows that more consumers are now willing to trade privacy for personalization, to provide information about themselves to providers they trust in exchange for a better online experience.


Read the full article

Privacy Blogs

Concurring Opinions

Privacy Digest

Privacy and Security Law Blog

TRUSTe Blog

David T.S. Fraser's Privacy Law Resources

The Privacy Place


En Español


Habeas Data

Kriptopolis

Internautas

Microsoft buys data protection start-up

Microsoft Corp has acquired Israeli start-up Secured Dimensions for a few million dollars. Secured Dimensions has developed a technology for the protection of applications based on Microsoft’s .NET platform. This is the latest move in Microsoft’s expansion of its technological activity in the Israeli market, after the announcement of its new R&D center, and the acquisition of two other companies Whale Communications, and Gteko.

Privacy Networks Inks Deal With CH2M HILL

Privacy Networks, the e-mail integrity company, today announced that CH2M HILL's Managed Services business unit will offer its PrivacyVault e-mail archiving solution as part of its array of IT services and offerings it provides to more than 1,400 worldwide customers. The agreement marks the continued rapid adoption of Privacy Networks' e-mail management solution by leading managed services providers (MSPs) and mid-sized businesses as part of the growing need to manage and retrieve Electronically Stored Information (ESI).

Read more

2 0 0 6 P R I V A C Y Y E A R I N R E V I E W

by EPIC

Millions of Military Records Go Missing

Identity Theft Keeps Top Spot

NSA Domestic Spying

H-P Spy Scandal

Choicepoint Gets Privacy Religion

Passenger Profiling and Terrorist Scoring

Digital Strip Searches

Europeans Battle US Over Privacy

Congress Passes Phone Pretexting Bill

National ID Cards

* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *

ISSUES TO WATCH IN 2007

Privacy Oversight and the New Congress

REAL ID Not So Real?

Renewed Interest in Medical Records Privacy

EU-US Privacy Showdown

"No-swipe" credit cards

Cell Phone Tracking and Spim

Privacy in Second Life

Databanks of Children

Sex Blogging

Smarter Cameras, More Surveillance

Future Lock-in

Future Lock-in: Or, I'll Agree to Do the Right Thing...Next Week
Todd Rogers and Max H. Bazerman
Harvard Business School WORKING KNOWLEDGE

Most of us believe that we should make certain choices—save more money or reduce gas consumption, for example—but we do not want to carry out these choices. In psychology this tension has been referred to as a "want/should" conflict. Rogers and Bazerman show through four experiments that people are more likely to choose what they believe they should choose when the choice will be implemented in the future rather than in the present, a tendency they call "future lock-in." They also discuss directions for future research and applications for public policy, an arena in which citizens are often asked to consider binding policies that trade short-term interests for long-term benefits.

Read the full article at Working Knowledge

Madridmasd: Suplemento noti+

Notiweb, es el boletín de noticias de I+D+i, de la web Madridmasd.org. En el boletín del día 2 de Enero de 2007, había un especial Chips de identificación: privacidad y libertad.

De cómo las tecnologías de identificación nos convierten en "presuntamente culpables"

Roberto Feltrero. Instituto de Filosofía. CSIC

Real Decreto 424/2005: Lagunas Peligrosas

Natalia Fernández (Directora de la Sociedad de las Indias Electrónicas)

Polémica en EE.UU. por la implantación de chips de identificación en trabajadores

Los biochips entran en las consultas

Un nuevo chip con láser promete revolucionar la transmisión de datos

Viaje al corazón del DNI electrónico

Blog madri+d
Tanto e-camino por recorrerDel blog Democracia Electrónica

Enlaces:

Asociación de Internautas

Kriptopolis

Agencia Española de Protección de Datos