Officers Ryan White and C.M. Route have been suspended following their use of a police computer to run a background check on President Obama. The computer, inside of a police car, was used to access the National Crime Information Center database managed by the FBI. Databases that are engineered to support data-mining present significant challenges to privacy rights because of the potential for their abuse and misuse. The NCIC has also faced challenges from privacy and civil liberties advocates because Federal Privacy Act requirements of accuracy do not apply.
A high school cheerleader claims that her coach demanded that she provide access information to a personal Facebook account. The coach is said to have used that access to logon and then shared content from the account with other school officials. The student was punished by school officials due to what the student claimed was information found on her Facebook account. The student is suing the school and teacher for violations of her Constitutional rights of privacy, free speech, and association.
Bozeman Montana required job applicants to provide their logons and passwords for personal social networking sites and private e-mail accounts. The city told job applicants that the information would be used to perform background checks. An anonymous tip made local media aware of the data collection. No word on what will happen to information already in the city's hands or what the new background check policy will be. Workplace privacy issues and social networking are raising questions about workers rights.
According to a GAO Report the Veterans Affairs Department (VA) is not providing privacy to wounded and disabled women veterans seeking services following their service in the Iraq and Afghanistan wars. The report said that the VA is not always making sure that women veterans are given privacy when they bathe and receive examinations.
The Office of the Privacy Commissioner of Canada released a Report of Findings into the Complaint Filed by the Canadian Internet Policy and Public Interest Clinic against Facebook Inc. The complaint, filed under the Personal Information Protection and Electronic Documents Act, contained twenty-four allegations concerning a range of Facebook business practices, including Default Privacy Settings, Advertising, and Third-Party Applications. The Commissioner found that Facebook has taken some steps to address privacy, but that more safeguards are necessary. Facebook has 30 days to respond.
Maryland State prisons can seize maximum security inmate mail because of security. The court ruled that a maximum security prisoner did not have a "reasonable expectation of privacy." The legal standard established for privacy protection is the reasonableness of a person's expectation for privacy in a given situation. This is why the standards for privacy within a community or society may change overtime.
For the second time, Kaiser is fined fined for violating CA medical privacy law. Medical information regarding Nadya Suleman and her children was inappropriately accessed again by hospital personnel. This fine following a $250,000 fine assessed earlier this year.
Federal and state authorities are shifing the burden of privacy protection to passport, drivers license, and state ID card holders. The State Department (Passports), Department of Homeland Security, (Enhanced Drivers Licenses, and National ID) and some State Motor Vehicle Administrations made the decision to include contactless unencrypted RFID technology in IDs. The information on the RFID chip can be read from 30 feet away using portable reader technology.
The State of New York is suing Tagged.com for "deceptive e-mail and marketing practices and invasion of privacy." The company is accused of deceiving visitors to its site into giving up their personal address book information, which it then used to send out invitations to join its social networking service. The Attorney General says, the company "stole the address books and identities of millions of people."
Facebook announced planned changes to user privacy controls today. Chris Kelly, Facebook's Chief Privacy Officer, stated that the new policy will promote "control, simplicity and connection" for user data. The announcement states there will be no changes in term of "the information Facebook provides to advertisers" but does not address concerns about the information provided by Facebook to app developers.
The Inspector Generals of the Intelligence Community released a report on the President's Surveillance Program. The report summarizes the unclassified collective results of the reviews. The Program involved the massive, warrantless surveillance of Americans in the United States. The IG Report finds that the absence of effective oversight contributed to the ineffectiveness of the program.
The National Security Agency (NSA) announced plans to build a 1 million square foot facility in Utah. Reports say that the agency is attempting to decentralize operations by dispersing its work to more regions. The agency in recent years had found its highly classified work under a microscope due to domestic spying activity prohibited by the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act law.
War drivers have moved, from looking for open wireless systems to obtain free Internet access, to skimming data off IDs that use unencrypted embedded radio frequency identification (RFID) chips. Government agencies are using RFID chips to remotely and silently check the identity of persons carrying these special ID documents. As RFID enabled government issued IDs become more prevalent government, commercial, and criminal applications for the technology will develop.
The NSA announced plans to build a million square foot new data center at the Camp Williams facility in Utah. It was reported that the agency began to design the new center in November. They project that construction would be completed by February. The center would house supercomputers that will be part of the NSA's signal intelligence program. A similar center is being planned for San Antonio Texas, and that agency would be expanding its facility at Ford Mead Maryland.
Researchers working from the Social Security Number (SSN) Death Master File discovered that most if not all of the numbers of the SSN could be guessed. SSNs were never intended to be used to approve credit, obtain a drivers license, apply for jobs, or register to vote, but that is how they have been used. Because they are valuable to identity thieves--not restricting their use to their original purpose is costing consumers tens of millions of dollars annually. The first three numbers of the SSN are based on the geographic location of ones' birth. The next two numbers are known as the "group number" and can change very slowly--sometimes spanning years for a region. The last four numbers of the SSN are allotted sequentially. The Master Death File is a list of SSN numbers assigned to persons who are now deceased. If the date and area of birth is known--then locating someone in the Master Death File with the same date and area of birth can allow guessing of the SSNs of individuals. Many users of social networking media are sharing basic information such as date of birth and place of birth.
On June 29, 2009, Chairman Jay Rockefeller of the Senate Commerce, Science and Transportation Committee called for the safe and appropriate disposal of consumer information collected through Verified Identity Pass, Inc. Senator Rockefeller sought information on the ability of Clear applicants and participants to reclaim their fees.
The project called Einstein was begun under the Bush Administration as a plan to allow the National Security Agency under the guidance of the Department of Homeland Security to monitor and protect civil government web sites. The agency had created a National Telecommunication Advisory Committee in 2006, which included AT&A and other Telecommunications companies. Some of these same companies and the NSA are being sued regarding participating in warrantless wiretapping of domestic calls. Now they are collaborating to watch visitors to non-defense related government web sites.
For several years self regulation was the buzz phrase for consumer oriented industries. The problem is self regulation has not worked. Consumers are not savvy enough or empowered enough to enforce their rights, while industry creates rules that are not in the consumers interest and that they are unable or unwilling to enforce on themselves. When self regulation is about privacy protection the challenges are even greater. The most recent installment on self regulation was offered by Internet advertisers. The one ray of hope for consumers is that these efforts are most often spurred by a fear that the FTC is poised to act.
Travelers wishing to get pre-screened to gain access to express lanes to airport security under went background checks. If they passed TSA background checks they then had to give up biometric information. Now that the company has declared bankruptcy there are questions about what it must now do to assure the privacy of those who applied or received entry into the registered traveler program.
