Tag Archives: privacy

Incriminating Words

“Stylometry has been cited by knowledgeable critics as proof of the pointlessness of the Nym Wars: why argue for the right to be anonymous or pseudonymous on Google Plus or Facebook when stylometry will de-anonymize you anyway?” {From: State of Adversarial Stylometry: can you change your prose-style? – Boing Boing.}

Your writing style may be more distinctive than you realize–but probably in a more mundane way than you would have probably hoped. The proposition that one’s identity can be discovered through the use of statistical analysis seems rather sinister–think of all the samizdat contributors whose lives would have been in yet more peril, if this technique had been readily available back in the bad old days.

Or, think about those people even now who are only free to share their experiences under the protective cover of a nom de plume, who learn of stylometry and withdraw from online discussions altogether, out of a precautionary fear. Maybe the tool in the above-linked article will help them, but who knows, really?

Long Memories

“The nation’s major mobile-phone providers are keeping a treasure trove of sensitive data on their customers, according to newly-released Justice Department internal memo that for the first time reveals the data retention policies of America’s largest telecoms.” {From:  Which Telecoms Store Your Data the Longest? Secret Memo Tells All | Threat Level | Wired.com}

By all means, check out the chart. Unfortunately, none of the major carriers come off particularly well. Especially Verizon.

Given that it seems as though every couple of days, another story about the constant erosion of consumer privacy breaks, I do wonder if we’re all starting to get used to the idea. I hope that’s not the case, but honestly–now that you’ve learned how bad data retention is, what are you going to do about it? Cancel your wireless service? Seriously?

Every Breath You Take

“The use of a GPS device to track your whereabouts is not an invasion of privacy in New Jersey, a state appellate court panel ruled today. Based on the battle of a divorcing Gloucester County couple, the decision helps clarify the rules governing a technology increasingly employed by suspicious spouses — many of whom hire private investigators.” {From: NJ Judge Rules GPS Tracking of Spouse Legal – Slashdot}

They talk about the legal limits of tracking your spouse via GPS in the article, but this whole thing still give me a nasty chill. On a positive note, perhaps we will never again have to hear one spouse shout at another the dreaded phrase, “WHERE THE HELL HAVE YOU BEEN?!”

Firewall Next Time

Tycho, on the recent spate of high-profile hacks: “Like the electronic smash and grab at Sony, I think the endgame here is better security at the places we trust with our data.”

Oh, if only that were true. Large institutions hardly ever seem to learn from these sorts of things, no matter how much they might stand to lose by failing to respond appropriately.

In fact, large institutions only ever resort to a single tactic when it comes to coping with well-publicized security failures, and that is to wildly overreact.

Corporate institutions end up treating their customer-base as if they were criminals, providing new and exciting hoops to jump through in order to use their own purchased content. (Try playing a game on Steam with a sketchy internet connection sometime.)

Government institutions tend to decide that the right course of action is to surveil the hell out of everyone, while also beating themselves about the head until they manage to forget that the word “warrant” was once a part of the English language.

The eventual retaliation will simultaneously fail to even inconvenience the hackers, while we–consumers and citizens–will get to deal with the repercussions of our flailing institutions for the foreseeable future.

Mmm… I could be wrong, but we’ll see.

UPDATE: It begins…