Bust Them Up Into a Hundred Million Pieces

[Weatherman2020]

For the last few weeks my car radio has been tuned to a certain FM radio station. Yesterday I turned it on in my home for the first time.

Today I’m getting ads for the radio station on my Facebook page.

I have never used the Internet to look them up, I don’t have an Alexia.

What I do have is an iPhone that is always on. Listening. And obviously reporting.

Orwellian.

 

[georgephillip]

Ready for the REALLY bad news?

"THE US GOVERNMENT ISN'T JUST TECH-ILLITERATE. IT'S TECH-INCOMPETENT"
The US Government Isn't Just Tech-Illiterate. It's Tech-Incompetent

It's hard to believe a congress that spends hours every day dialing for dollars will find time to become technologically literate.

 

[SassyIrishLass]

Fakebook has been caught giving companies access to member info and even private messages. Netflix was mentioned. Lawsuit filed.

No link it was just on ABC news.

 

[SassyIrishLass]

Microsoft and Bing was given acess and permission to member's personal data by FB.

 

[Weatherman2020]

Fakebook has been caught giving companies access to member info and even private messages. Netflix was mentioned. Lawsuit filed.

No link it was just on ABC news.

But I’ve only listened to the station. Which means they are listening in. Yeah, sounds paranoid but it is what it is.

 

[SassyIrishLass]

Fakebook has been caught giving companies access to member info and even private messages. Netflix was mentioned. Lawsuit filed.

No link it was just on ABC news.

But I’ve only listened to the station. Which means they are listening in. Yeah, sounds paranoid but it is what it is.

I got rid of Facebook long ago but they're not the only ones doing it. Google is for sure

 

[georgephillip]

Data Privacy Concerns with Google – Hacker Noon

"Google’s parent company, Alphabet, has a market cap of $712 billion.

"Within Google’s range of products, there are seven with at least one billion users.

"In its privacy policy, the company outlines its broad and far-reaching data collection.

"The data collection extends to Google’s entire suite of products, meaning the amount of data the company stores is enormous.

"Google holds an estimated 15 exabytes of data, or the capacity of ~30 million personal computers."

I'm about as far from tech savvy as possible, but I've heard many times if you use Google or Microsoft (I use both), you have signed away your privacy.

 

[JimBowie1958]

Yes, electronics in general are spying on you.

Are your phone camera and microphone spying on you? | Dylan Curran

Here is what the former FBI director James Comey said when he was asked back in September 2016 if he covered his laptop’s webcam with tape.

“Heck yeah, heck yeah. Also, I get mocked for a lot of things, and I am much mocked for that, but I hope people lock their cars … lock your doors at night. I have an alarm system, if you have an alarm system you should use it, I use mine.”

If he does, we all should.

Who could be accessing your camera and microphone?

Apps like WhatsApp, Facebook, Snapchat, Instagram, Twitter, LinkedIn, Viber
Felix Krause described in 2017 that when a user grants an app access to their camera and microphone, the app could do the following:

• Access both the front and the back camera.
• Record you at any time the app is in the foreground.
• Take pictures and videos without telling you.
• Upload the pictures and videos without telling you.
• Upload the pictures/videos it takes immediately.
• Run real-time face recognition to detect facial features or expressions.
• Livestream the camera on to the internet.
• Detect if the user is on their phone alone, or watching together with a second person.
• Upload random frames of the video stream to your web service and run a proper face recognition software which can find existing photos of you on the internet and create a 3D model based on your face.

For instance, here’s a Find my Phone application which a documentary maker installed on a phone, then let someone steal it. After the person stole it, the original owner spied on every moment of the thief’s life through the phone’s camera and microphone.

The documentary tracks every move of this person, from brushing their teeth to going to work. To grabbing a bite to eat with their co-worker to intimate moments with a loved one. This is the power of apps that have access to your camera and microphone.

The government

• Edward Snowden revealed an NSA program called Optic Nerves. The operation was a bulk surveillance program under which they captured webcam images every five minutes from Yahoo users’ video chats and then stored them for future use. It is estimated that between 3% and 11% of the images captured contained “undesirable nudity”.
• Government security agencies like the NSA can also have access to your devices through in-built backdoors. This means that these security agencies can tune in to your phone calls, read your messages, capture pictures of you, stream videos of you, read your emails, steal your files … at any moment they please.

Hackers
Hackers can also gain access to your device with extraordinary ease via apps, PDF files, multimedia messages and even emojis.

An application called Metasploit on the ethical hacking platform Kali uses an Adobe Reader 9 (which over 60% of users still use) exploit to open a listener (rootkit) on the user’s computer. You alter the PDF with the program, send the user the malicious file, they open it, and hey presto – you have total control over their device remotely.​

Once a user opens this PDF file, the hacker can then:

• Install whatever software/app they like on the user’s device.
• Use a keylogger to grab all of their passwords.
• Steal all documents from the device.
• Take pictures and stream videos from their camera.
• Capture past or live audio from the microphone.
• Upload incriminating images/documents to their PC, and notify the police.

And, if it’s not enough that your phone is tracking you – surveillance cameras in shops and streets are tracking you, too

• You might even be on this website, InSeCam, which allows ordinary people online to watch surveillance cameras free of charge. It even allows you to search cameras by location, city, time zone, device manufacturer, and specify whether you want to see a kitchen, bar, restaurant or bedroom.

How would we feel if someone were standing outside our bedroom window, staring in through the curtains. The most common response would be to call the police. However, what do we do when everyone is being monitored? We shake our head, and try to forget it’s happening. Try to go on with our lives and ignore the constant nag that we’re being watched.​

 

[JimBowie1958]

Your Computer and Phone Cameras Are On -- Beware! | HuffPost

Between 2008 and 2012, GCHQ, Britain’s NSA, ran a program called Optic Nerve that scanned live webcam chats on Yahoo (and probably other chat services). Many of the images obtained were very personal ones and could be used to either embarrass or blackmail users. Reports in the UK say that NSA engineers helped GCHQ develop the Optic Nerve program. Many have either claimed or speculated that one way the NSA and other U.S. spy agencies got around the prohibition of spying on Americans was to let a third party do it for them. According to the New York Times, the Australian Signals Directorate tapped a U.S. law firm representing Indonesian interests and offered their intercepts to the NSA.This sort of special intelligence cooperation is a regular occurrence under the “Five Eyes” program. The cooperating countries are the U.S., U.K., Australia, New Zealand and Canada.

News reports, based on the leaks of NSA information by Edward Snowden, say that GCHQ stored millions of images gleaned from its webcam surveillance. These images can be retrieved in various ways, including the use of advanced face recognition systems, so seemingly unrelated video chats from different computers and with different names or web addresses, can be linked together. Obviously, when used correctly and legally, this is an important counter-terrorism tool. But when it is used as a political tool to harass or blackmail people, the consequences are different and corrosive. A problem the U.S. government still has, new legislation notwithstanding, is how to assure the proper handling of extremely personal information that is completely unrelated to any counter terrorism or criminal activity.

But the NSA and GCHQ aren’t the only entities spying on webcams. Marcus Thomas, a former assistant director of the FBI’s Operational Technology Division in Quantico,Virginia, tells the Washington Post that the FBI could spy on anyone’s webcam without turning on the camera’s indicator light. While not all webcams have indicator lights, and many laptops do not have them at all, the indicator light is a nice security feature that tells you when the camera is active. Webcam spying is part of a suite of so-called Remote Access Tools or RATS. Thomas told the Post that the FBI has had these tools for years but uses “Rattingly” (the webcam spying tool) sparingly.​

 

[JimBowie1958]

Electronics all over your home could be spying on you. Here’s how to stop it

Case in point, a Canadian sex toy manufacturer agreed to hand over $4 million to settle a privacy lawsuit last week after a customer discovered its Bluetooth controlled, app-connected vibrator secretly collected highly sensitive personal data, right down to the date and time the device was used.

READ MORE: Canadian sex toy maker settles $4M lawsuit claiming We-Vibe tracked private data

A week prior, WikiLeaks claimed powerful surveillance tools once held deep inside the CIA could be designed to turn any connected device — smart TVs, phones, and even cars — into tools to spy on their owners. And while it’s hard to imagine the CIA would want to spy on the average person, let alone the average Canadian, it’s important to remember hackers have been targeting so-called smart devices for years.

As former Ontario Privacy Commissioner Ann Cavoukian puts it, “Beware of all things smart, in terms of TVs and smart fridges and all that kind of stuff.”

So, in a world where even the most private of devices offer internet-connected features, how do you protect your privacy in your own home?

Take the old school approach, put some tape over your webcam
Long before there were web-connected TVs to toy with, hackers began taking control of computers, baby monitors and gaming systems, often spying on their victims using the webcam attached to the device.

One do-it-yourself trick users have often turned to is covering their computer or gaming system’s built-in webcam with a piece of tape – that way, if hackers gain control of your device and are able to access the webcam, they aren’t able to see much of anything.​

 

[JimBowie1958]

9 things in your home that may be spying on you

A recent murder investigation had police asking Amazon for recordings made by its Echo device, which conceivably could have recorded the murder taking place.

9 devices that can spy in your home

The British newspaper The Guardian recently published a disturbing report on all the devices in our homes that are connected to the internet and have the capability of sharing our innermost secrets with people all over the world.

These potentially “spying” (or at least sharing) devices include:

1. Amazon’s Echo (and its Alexa digital assistant)

2. Google Home (Google’s version of Echo)

3. Networked video games, like the Xbox Kinect

4. Smart TV’s

5. Facebook Live

6. Laptop Skype cameras (which face you at all times)

7. Home security cameras

8. Baby monitors

9. Internet connected appliances (like Samsung’s new Family Hub refrigerator, that has web-connected cameras inside)

How can you prevent spying?

Apolonio Garcia is the president of a Cincinnati-based information technology company, HealthGuard IT Security.

“Everything from a crock pot, to a thermostat, to your car … all these things have the ability to receive and transmit data, wirelessly, across the internet, which make our lives so much easier," Garcia said.

But he says that convenience can come with a price.

 

[rightwinger]

For the last few weeks my car radio has been tuned to a certain FM radio station. Yesterday I turned it on in my home for the first time.

Today I’m getting ads for the radio station on my Facebook page.

I have never used the Internet to look them up, I don’t have an Alexia.

What I do have is an iPhone that is always on. Listening. And obviously reporting.

Orwellian.

Funny

Every time I log on to USMB there are Russian women wanting to meet me

 

[whitehall]

Retired Lt. General Flynn might face prison time for lying the the FBI but Zuckerberg lied to congress. Doesn't that count for something? Everyone saw it and Facebook spokespeople even apologized for it. Why doesn't Zuckerberg face indictment? Hypocrite lefties used to hate corporate America and Facebook is the epitome of corporate America but for some reason the left seems to defend the type of (liberal) crooked corporate America that donated to democrats.

 

[rightwinger]

Retired Lt. General Flynn might face prison time for lying the the FBI but Zuckerberg lied to congress. Doesn't that count for something? Everyone saw it and Facebook spokespeople even apologized for it. Why doesn't Zuckerberg face indictment? Hypocrite lefties used to hate corporate America and Facebook is the epitome of corporate America but for some reason the left seems to defend the type of (liberal) crooked corporate America that donated to democrats.

Republicans run the Justice Dept

 

[Oddball]

 

[Weatherman2020]

9 things in your home that may be spying on you

A recent murder investigation had police asking Amazon for recordings made by its Echo device, which conceivably could have recorded the murder taking place.

9 devices that can spy in your home

The British newspaper The Guardian recently published a disturbing report on all the devices in our homes that are connected to the internet and have the capability of sharing our innermost secrets with people all over the world.

These potentially “spying” (or at least sharing) devices include:

1. Amazon’s Echo (and its Alexa digital assistant)

2. Google Home (Google’s version of Echo)

3. Networked video games, like the Xbox Kinect

4. Smart TV’s

5. Facebook Live

6. Laptop Skype cameras (which face you at all times)

7. Home security cameras

8. Baby monitors

9. Internet connected appliances (like Samsung’s new Family Hub refrigerator, that has web-connected cameras inside)

How can you prevent spying?

Apolonio Garcia is the president of a Cincinnati-based information technology company, HealthGuard IT Security.

“Everything from a crock pot, to a thermostat, to your car … all these things have the ability to receive and transmit data, wirelessly, across the internet, which make our lives so much easier," Garcia said.

But he says that convenience can come with a price.

My damn washer and dryer are spying on me.