Privacy (from Latin: privatus "separated from the rest, deprived of something, esp. office, participation in the government", from privo "to deprive") is the ability of an individual or group to seclude themselves or information about themselves and thereby reveal themselves selectively. The boundaries and content of what is considered private differ among cultures and individuals, but share basic common themes.
All stories in Privacy
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Google stops sharing your network data with carriers over privacy concerns
Google shuts down Mobile Network Insights service over concerns that "sharing data from users of its Android phone system ...
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Google study says people are still using old passwords after being compromised
A study released by Google has found that approximately 1.5 percent of all sign-ins used across the web involved credentials ...
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Apple will soon treat online web tracking the same as a security vulnerability
Apple ups its privacy batte with a new "WebKit Tracking Prevention Policy" that aims to prevent all forms covert tracking ...
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Facebook's group privacy settings actually make sense now
Until today, Facebook has given you three options for creating a user group: Open, closed, or 'secret.' While the first is ...
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Amazon says its facial recognition tech can now detect fear
Amazon has announced that its Rekognition facial recognition system can now detect a person's "fear," among other accuracy ...
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FBI proposal outlines plans for large-scale collection of social media data
The Federal Bureau of Investigation is planning to step up its efforts to monitor social media platforms more aggressively ...
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Cryptocurrency scammers have netted $4.26B so far this year, report
Cryptocurrency scammers continued to swindle funds throughout Q2 2019, netting approximately $4.26 billion so far this year. ...
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Moonday Mornings: IBM wants to put your browser history on the blockchain, forever
Welcome to another Moonday Mornings. Let's waste no time and take a look at the weekend's cryptocurrency and blockchain headlines ...
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Apple will limit VoIP background data collection from WhatsApp, Snapchat et al in iOS 13
Apple is reportedly planning a new feature in iOS that will restrict apps from runing VoIP in the background when the programs ...
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WhatsApp's chat manipulation exploit remains unresolved even after a year (Updated)
Vulnerabilities uncovered in WhatsApp by cybersecurity firm Checkpoint can allow bad actors to exploit the platform to manipulate ...
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Google and Facebook are gonna hate Apple's new privacy-preserving online ads
Apple has outlined a new Safari feature, called Privacy Preserving Ad Click Attribution, that aims to stop online ads from ...
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Facebook, stop trying to make Libra happen
Data protection bosses from all over the world are concerned about Facebook Libra's potential privacy issues.
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The UK illegally copied sensitive personal data from EU databases, but the EU doesn’t seem to care
EU officials confirmed that the UK made illegal copies of a Schengen database, but MEPs worry there are more data breaches ...
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Equifax probably owes you $125. Here’s how to collect
TNW recently reported the US Federal Trade Commision (FTC) had passed down a rather friendly little fine to Equifax – ...
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Facebook gets away with $5B FTC fine for leaking your data
The US Federal Trade Commission (FTC) has slapped a $5 billion fine on Facebook in wake of the Cambridge Analytica scandal ...
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Police demand access to sexual assault survivors' phones — or have their case dropped
In April, the UK police introduced consent forms asking sexual assault survivors for permission to access their personal ...
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The Jour mindfulness app helps you build a daily journaling habit
Mental health problems are one of the leading causes of disease burden worldwide, and major depression is the second leading ...
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Google and Facebook are tracking your porn preferences – even in incognito mode
It turns out Google and Facebook are tracking your porn consumption habits – and even incognito mode can't save you from ...
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How to request FaceApp to remove your data from its servers
A short guide on how you can ask FaceApp to remove your data from its servers. There are a lot privacy concerns surrounding ...
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Loyalty programs cost you your personal data — are the rewards worth it?
Rewards and loyalty programs are increasingly becoming a way to access your personal information. These apps make it easy ...
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Facebook now tells you where brands are getting your ad targeting data
Facebook has announced a series of updates to its "Why am I seeing this ad?" and Ad Preferences tools with an aim to bring ...
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Google contractors are secretly listening to your Assistant recordings
Not only is your Google Home device listening to you, a new report suggests there might be a Google contractor who’s listening ...
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UK Alexa users can now get answers to medical questions right from the NHS
The NHS teams up with Amazon's Alexa digital voice assistant to help answer medical queries with advice from the service's ...
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US risks its leading role in tech by leaving regulations to the EU
The borderless nature of tech regulation puts immense power in the hands of the EU, which has emerged as the de-facto global ...
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Amazon confirms it retains your Alexa voice recordings indefinitely
Amazon has confirmed that it keeps Alexa transcripts and voice recordings indefinitely, and only removes them if they're ...
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‘The world’s greatest email app’ is a privacy nightmare
Superhuman isn't all that super.
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Dutch ministers push for cryptocurrency regulation to fight money laundering
Dutch ministers want to regulate cryptocurrencies as part of a wider effort to tackle money laundering in the country.
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Here's why India wants to build its own WhatsApp and Gmail
The Indian government is reportedly plannning to build its own WhatsApp-like chat platform to facilitate secure communications ...
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MySpace employees reportedly read your mid-2000s DMs
Long before Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram ruled the social media world, there was Myspace. One of the earliest social ...
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Facebook’s Libra partners remain cautious amid growing scrutiny from regulators
Facebook's Libra partners have reportedly signed non-binding agreements, meaning they're not obliged to promote or use the ...
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Bought a used Nest security cam? The previous owner can spy on you (Update: Fixed)
A new report by Wirecutter finds some users who sold their Nest cam devices are able to access images from their old cameras ...
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Google open-sources cryptographic tool to keep data sets private
Google open-sources Private Join and Compute, a new secure multi-party computation (MPC) tool designed to help organizations ...
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India is still hounding WhatsApp to make its messages traceable
Indian aks WhatApp to "digitally fingerprint" every message sent on its platform without breaking encryption, according to ...
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Tim Cook takes aim at tech companies for creating 'chaos'
Apple CEO Tim Cook once again took shots at Silicon Valley tech companies in his Stanford commencement speech on Sunday.
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PSA: Set your Venmo transactions to private right now
A new research has found that Venmo continues to make it easy for third-parties to scrap users' public transaction history ...
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Apple's privacy-focused features risk trapping users in its walled garden
An update to the App Store Review Guidelines reveals that apps that use other companies' single sign-on features will be ...
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Addressing the privacy paradox: Top leaders and experts share insights
During TNW Conference 2019, top government officials, business and technology leaders came together at The Assembly to discuss ...
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Why Gary Vaynerchuk thinks the death of privacy is a good thing
Gary Vaynerchuk wades into the privacy debate and explains why he thinks that most people care about privacy in theory. But ...
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Privacy is Apple’s most premium product
However, Apple was selling another feature to all of us – privacy. Apple took jibes at Google and Facebook and tracking ...
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Apple introduces privacy-focused 'Sign in with Apple' button for sites and apps
Apple introduces privacy-focused 'Sign in with Apple' button for sites and apps to keep the app trackers away from tracking ...
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Google is cracking down on Drive and Chrome extensions that abuse your data
Google has announced new policies for Chrome extensions and Drive API that ensures developers only have necessary permissions ...
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Amazon adds vocal command to delete saved Alexa recordings
Amazon recently announced an easy solution for privacy-conscious individuals to delete the devices’ saved recordings. Now, ...
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PSA: You can now delete your voice recordings with an Alexa command
Amazon is now rolling out a pair of Alexa voice commands that allows you to delete voice recordings without using its website. ...
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Your iPhone is leaking personal info to tracking companies
The Washington Post finds a lot of third-party iOS apps are sending sensitive personal information to tracking companies. ...
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Apple's privacy reputation at risk with new iTunes class-action lawsuit
Three iTunes file a federal lawsuit against Apple alleging that the company unlawfully collects and sells their iTunes listening ...
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Why the future of US data regulation must come from Congress
As of May 2019, over 20 US states have introduced bills seeking to regulate data privacy, data security, or some combination ...
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Kenya is allegedly selling citizen data to highest corporate bidder
According to Dr. Roselyn K. Akombe, Chief of Policy Planning and Guidance at the United Nations and ex-commissioner of Kenya's ...
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Listen, parents, here are 3 reasons you shouldn't use child tracking apps
The use of self-tracking and personal surveillance technologies has grown considerably over the last decade. There are now ...
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South African voters fear mobile political campaigns will steal their personal info
Mobile technology will arguably go down in history as the most successful innovation of our lifetime. Mobile devices, especially ...
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Twitter bug accidentally shared location data of some iOS users
Twitter says it has fixed a security bug that resulted in a user's approximate location information being shared with an ...
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Google forces Nest users to use Google accounts, raising privacy concerns
Google's Nest rebranding gets rid of the privacy barrier between Google and Nest, and the move has significant implications ...
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Google's case for privacy is more convincing than Facebook's
A week after Facebook's F8 conference, Google makes a case for privacy, stating how a lot of new features have been built ...
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Facebook contract workers look at your private posts to help train its AI
A new report from Reuters has revealed how contract workers for Facebook and Instagram are looking at your private posts ...
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Here's what Facebook announced at its F8 developer keynote
Facebook announces a redesign of its social network alongside updates to Messenger, Instagram and WhatsApp at F8 deve conference. ...
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PSA: You can now auto-delete your location and web history on Google
Google has announced it is rolling out new auto-delete controls for Location History and Web & App Activity that allows users ...
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Here are the 7 requirements for building ethical AI, according to the EU commission
In October, Amazon had to discontinue an artificial intelligence–powered recruiting tool after it discovered the system ...
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How Facebook plans to keep your data private while opening it up to researchers
Facebook has outlined a differential privacy-based approach that it expects will protect users' confidentiality while simultaneously ...
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Facebook clamps down on personality quizzes to plug data leaks
Facebook has updated its devloper platform policies to subject apps with minimal utility, such as personality quizzes, to ...
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Facebook sets aside billions to pay its way through privacy issues
Facebook said it has set aside $3 billion in connection with an ongoing FTC investigation into its privacy abuses set off ...
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Facebook uploaded 1.5 million people’s email contacts without permission
Welcome to the newest episode of "Facebook screws up daily." it uploaded contact lists of over 1.5 million people since 2016, ...
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Jumbo is an iPhone app that clears your old tweets and Google searches
There’s an insane amount of news every day about social networks screwing up and compromising user data. So, it’s advisable ...
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Big tech’s ‘ethical guidelines’ are no substitute for real regulation
Data ethics is now a cause célèbre. “Digital ethics and privacy” shot into research and advisory company Gartner’s ...
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Smart cities are an AI-powered dystopia that's already happening
Separating the futuristic from the dystopian in the minds of the general public can be a challenge, particularly when trying ...
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How to stop people from adding you to WhatsApp groups
WhatsApp announced a feature that allows people to stop others from adding them to group without consent. Now, the feature ...
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Activision knows when its employees are having sex
The Washington Post this week reported Activision Blizzard has been using various apps to track its employees' health ...
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WhatsApp finally lets you prevent people from adding you to their shitty groups
WhatsApp is finally rolling out a feature that will prevent anyone from adding you to a group without your permission from ...
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Rebuilding trust in democracy starts with digital identity verification
As Mark Zuckerberg recently wrote, “free and fair elections are the heart of every democracy.” Despite controversy over ...
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Facebook announces a long-overdue transparency tool for News Feed
Over the weekend, Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg sounded the alarm, calling for increased government regulation for internet ...
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The rise of the ubiquitous voice assistant
Apple, Amazon, and Google have done a great job educating users that voice is here! Voice recognition has been getting better ...
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No, viewing publicly shared Google Docs don't reveal your identity
Every day, millions of people use Google Docs to share and collaborate on documents. And when it comes to working on documents ...
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PSA: MetaMask reveals your Ethereum address to sites you visit, here’s how to hide it
There's a setting disabled by popular Ethereum service MetaMask by default, and its putting the privacy of cryptocurrency ...
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Think about privacy the next time you ask Alexa the weather
As long as voice assistants are on the rise, data privacy should be too. The market is now saturated with voice assistants ...
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Rift widens between Epic and gamers over data mining allegations
Epic Games is being torn a new one by gamers again. This time, it's been accused of mining users' Steam data without their ...
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Mark Zuckerberg plans to make Facebook more private with 6 key changes
Mark Zuckerberg wants to make Facebook less like a town square, and more like a living room. So he declares in a massive ...
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We’re not safe without information privacy
It’s not just because you are a criminal and the coppers might catch you. Or because you really, really hate big corporations ...
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PSA: Don’t give out your phone number for Facebook 2FA, use an app instead
It's no secret that Facebook doesn't respect your privacy in the least: we learned last October that the company used the ...
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Ad blockers threaten digital marketers’ ability to understand customers
Digital advertisers know they’re screwed. Digital marketers don’t. Considering statistics like one in four US internet ...
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Facebook "owns" my family: a cautionary fable
I hate New Year. I don’t do resolutions and am generally “bah, humbug” about the whole hullabaloo. This year, my ...
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Facebook sucks for privacy, but how good are advertisers at targeting me?
Amid the massive hue and cry about Facebook’s utter disregard for data privacy, and the illicit use of personally identifiable ...
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Why data privacy is hot and machine learning is not
Looking back on the past twelve months, we will all remember cybersecurity scares, revelations of data malpractices, and ...
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Facial recognition tech sucks, but it’s inevitable
Is facial recognition accurate? Can it be hacked? These are just some of the questions being raised by lawmakers, civil libertarians, ...
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Depressing lessons 2018's endless data breaches taught us
In the days after Facebook's September announcement about a bug that may have compromised 90 million users – yes, that ...
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How to decentralize social media, according to Wikipedia’s co-founder
The problem about social media is that it is centralized. Centralization empowers massive corporations and governments ...
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Laws can't keep up with sex robots' ethical and privacy issues
From the Drudge Report to The New York Times, sex robots are rapidly becoming a part of the national conversation about the ...
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15 strategies everyone should know to protect their online information
As technology increases at an ever-faster rate, so too do the ways in which our information can be put at risk. With the ...
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Apple's crackdown on screen-recording apps is a privacy win
Apple’s iOS screen recording functionality – which was first introduced in version 11 back in 2017 – comes in handy ...
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Why Germany wants to block Facebook's Messenger-Instagram-WhatsApp merger
Facebook made a splash recently when CEO Mark Zuckerberg's plans to integrate its messaging platforms on Instagram, Messenger, ...
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Facebook's totally not listening to you, its new ad disclosure feature screams desperately
Remember hearing about - or worse, feeling like - people seeing ads related to topics they've merely talked about with friends ...
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Google has quietly dropped ban on personally identifiable web tracking
This article was originally published by ProPublica on October 21st, 2016. When Google bought the advertising network ...
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This week's Facebook-Google-Apple drama, explained
With so much happening in the tech world, this week feels like it’s 21 days long. The highlight of the week has been the ...
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New macOS malware steals your cookies to swipe your cryptocurrency
Security researchers from Palo Alto Networks' Unit 42 have uncovered a new cryptocurrency stealing malware that specifically ...
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After Facebook, Google apologizes for running a user data collection program on iOS
Last night, just when we were trying to get our heads around Facebook's data collecting program, TechCrunch reported that ...
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How to hide everything from everyone on your PlayStation 4
Welcome to TNW Basics, a collection of tips, tricks, guides, and advice on how to get the most out of your gadgets, apps, ...
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How 2018 became Facebook’s worst year in privacy and security
In early December, Facebook’s developer team declared the discovery of a security bug that gave developers access to ...
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How to review and delete your Google search history
Your Google search history includes the queries you've entered into Google search when you're signed in. Here's how to wipe ...
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US police can't force you to unlock your phone with fingerprints or face recognition
A US federal court judge ruled that police can't compel suspects to unlock their phones using biometrics like face recognition, ...
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NASA looks to secure flight data with blockchain tech
NASA is exploring potential use-cases for blockchain technology in a bid to safeguard the privacy and security of aircraft ...
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Google twists Samourai Wallet's arm to disable privacy features
Samourai Wallet, a bitcoin wallet provider, is temporarily disabling some of its privacy-related features following a request ...
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Weather apps are secretly selling your location data to the highest bidder
Location data is a funny thing. You need it to get an accurate forecast, and they, the app-maker, need it to cash in on a ...
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How blockchain technology can — and can't — prevent sexual assault
This story explores how projects like Callisto and LegalFling are using blockchain technology to store vital information ...
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The free internet makes us the product — we need to stop it
The bad headlines continue to stack up for Facebook this year: from the Cambridge Analytica scandal, to the New York Times ...
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Google reportedly shuts down its Chinese censored search project
Google has stopped key data analysis needed for its highly contested China project, the censored search engine 'Dragonfly' ...
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Blockchains should have ‘privacy by design’ for GDPR compliance
LTO Network hosted speakers at Hard Fork Decentralized last night to tackle some of the blockchain industry's toughest GDPR ...
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This website sets your Spotify playlists to private with a single click
Nobody will know you love Peter Andre
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US government building tools to deanonymize anonymous cryptocurrencies
If you thought you were safe using privacy coins like Zcash and Monero, think again, the US government is developing forensic ...
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What GoDaddy is doing wrong about privacy — here’s what it should do
GoDaddy asks users to pay for privacy protection. It's distasteful that a large domain registrar would charge a fee for a ...
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7 EU countries accuse Google of violating GDPR by tracking users
Consumer groups in the Netherlands, Poland, Czechia, Greece, Slovenia, Sweden, and Norway have asked regulators to look into ...
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Uber fined €1M for 2016 data breach by Dutch and British privacy watchdogs
The Dutch Data Protection Authority and UK's Information Commissioner's Office have fined Uber over €1M the company's data ...
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Here's how we take back control over our digital identities
The data reckoning has arrived. We’re already too familiar with the breach headlines: Equifax, Under Armour, Target. But ...
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Microchip implants are threatening workers’ rights
It’s not often trades unions and employers are equally worried about an issue threatening workers’ rights. But recently, ...
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Please appreciate Mozilla’s security-focused gift guide
Shout out Mozilla. The not-for-profit company behind the web-browser Firefox has put together a gift guide with a difference. ...
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Report: Microsoft’s enterprise products covertly gather personal data on users
Microsoft collects and stores personal data about the behavior of individual users of its enterprise offerings on a large ...
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We’re living in digital serfdom — trading privacy for convenience
Think for a second: compared to your grandparents and parents, what do you actually own outright? Why own when you can ...
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China has a new surveillance tool that identifies citizens by how they walk
Chinese authorities have begun deploying a new surveillance tool designed to identify people by how they walk, or the shapes ...
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Twitter's privacy settings, explained
Twitter is one of the most open social media platforms on the web, which is why it might be easier to ignore the privacy ...
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When your boss knows everything about you
Big data and algorithmic decision making have become an indispensable part of the human resources toolkit at companies.
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Is Tim Cook the champion of privacy?
Today’s ceaseless data scandals have everyone talking about privacy, especially insofar as our favorite digital devices ...
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Tim Cook supports EU’s strict privacy laws — but thinks taxes are 'crap'
Apple's CEO, Tim Cook, gave a keynote at ICDPPC where he called for better data policies in tech and lauded EU's GDPR. Unfortunately, ...
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50% of American WhatsApp users don't know it's owned by Facebook
Research from the search engine DuckDuckGo has revealed 50 percent of American WhatsApp users don't realize Facebook owns ...
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Here's how to keep advertisers from using your phone number on Facebook
A Gizmodo report on Wednesday detailed the latest in a long series of Facebook privacy blunders. The report said, and Facebook ...
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Without coaching our privacy, does Google even have a business?
Google is on a seemingly-ceaseless crusade to turn every one of its users into an open book that it can exploit for valuable ...
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Google and Mastercard are secretly tracking your offline purchases
Google has quietly been providing select advertisers a "stockpile" of offline credit card transaction data. After a four ...
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Facebook recently started asking banks for your financial data
A report from the Wall Street Journal today revealed Facebook was attempting to gain detailed financial information from ...
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All Android phones should run stock OS (including you Samsung!)
Countless consumers around the globe cherish the customization options available to them when it comes to their smartphones, ...
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GDPR is eroding our privacy, not protecting it
It's been more than a couple of months since GDPR (the EU General Data Protection Regulation) came into force. The promise ...
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Facebook's Digital Literacy Library is an imperfect course in online etiquette
Facebook today released a "Digital Literacy Library," a series of education modules designed to help parents and teachers ...
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This is how you can personalize marketing campaigns — without violating GDPR
GDPR -- no other four letters are giving tech companies a bigger headache this year. So many articles have been written about ...
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How cryptography enables online shopping, cloud tech, and the blockchain
What do the Gallic Wars and online shopping have in common? The answer, believe it or not, is cryptography. Cryptography ...
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Privacy Statement
Privacy Statement This Privacy Statement applies to personal data collected, used and stored by The Next Web B.V. having ...
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WhatsApp's label for forwarded messages won't be enough to battle fake news
Continuing its mission to help fight the spread of misinformation on its platform, WhatsApp is introducing a label to help ...
