Eighty percent of users’ browsing histories can be captured by online trackers, InfoSecurity Magazine reports. Summarizing Norton Labs’ quarterly Consumer Cyber Safety Pulse Report, it showed consumers are monitored by an average of 177 different organizations per week. The report also found half the trackers can obtain the 80% of browsing history within the first two hours of surfing the internet. Even if users deleted their history every day, they would re-encounter half the trackers within two hours. Also, Norton reported blocking approximately 3.6 billion cyberthreats last year. Full Story
Author: Nora Reidy
State Sen. Angela Turner-Ford, D-Miss., introduced Senate Bill 2330, the Mississippi Consumer Data Privacy Act. The bill proposes data subject rights, a “do not sell” provision, a private right of action and attorney general enforcement. Additionally, The Vermont General Assembly has two comprehensive privacy bills proposed in the House of Representatives. House Bill 160 was carried over from the 2021 legislative session while H.570 was raised at the start of the current session. Read More
Axios reports some athletes participating in the 2022 Olympic Games will be provided burner phones to use instead of personal devices while in Beijing amid surveillance concerns. Some athletes have been advised to leave laptops and phones at home, while others — including athletes from Canada, Germany and Great Britain — are being provided temporary devices. The U.S. is encouraging disposable devices. “Assume that every device and every communication, transaction, and online activity will be monitored,” the U.S. Olympic & Paralympic Committee said. Full Story
At least 60 Red Cross and Red Crescent National Societies had the personal data of more than 515,000 “highly vulnerable” victims breached, InfoSecurity Magazine reports. The data was stolen from a Swiss contractor that stored it for the global humanitarian organization based in Geneva, Switzerland. The breach affected some of the most vulnerable people in the world, including those separated from their families due to conflict, migration or disaster, missing persons, and those in detention in various countries. Full Story
A ransomware attack against school website infrastructure provider Finalsite potentially impacted thousands of schools, InfoSecurity Magazine reports. Finalsite, which serves more than 8,000 schools worldwide, said it identified ransomware on its systems Jan. 4 but has found no evidence data was compromised. The total number of schools impacted has not been disclosed. Since the incident, the company said its security, infrastructure and engineering teams have been working “to restore backup systems and bring our network back to full performance, in a safe and secure manner.” Full Story
Employers in New York must disclose electronic monitoring, such as internet access and videoconferencing, to new hires under a new law taking effect in May, as workers contend with an employment landscape that’s increasingly dependent on technology. The new law comes amid a worldwide push for greater privacy protections for consumers and workers, adding compliance obligations for businesses that must contend with general consumer privacy laws and employee-specific statutes. Read More
What should teachers be expected to know about student data privacy and ethics? Considering so much of their jobs now revolve around student data, it’s a simple enough question—and one that researcher Ellen B. Mandinach and a colleague were tasked with answering. More specifically, they wanted to know what state guidelines had to say on the matter. Was that information included in codes of education ethics? Or perhaps in curriculum requirements for teacher training programs? “The answer is, ‘Not really,’” says Mandinach, a senior research scientist at the nonprofit WestEd. “Very few state standards have anything about protecting privacy, or…
The Indiana Senate voted 49-0 to pass Senate Bill 358, an act concerning consumer data protection, and move it to the House of Representatives for further consideration. Following amendments in committee to align the bill with Virginia’s Consumer Data Protection Act, SB 358 made one additional change on the floor to move the law’s effective date to Jan. 1, 2025. The bill will need to clear one House committee and receive two favorable floor votes to earn final passage. Read More
The U.S. Federal Bureau of Investigation confirmed it tested Israeli technology firm NSO Group’s Pegasus spyware for potential use in criminal cases in 2019, Axios reports. The Department of Justice and FBI were determining if Pegasus could hack into Americans’ smartphones at the time of the testing. The spyware has been used to hack smartphones belonging to human rights activists, political dissidents and reporters around the world. An FBI spokesperson said the spyware was used in “product testing and evaluation only.” Full Story
In a letter to U.S. President Joe Biden, a group of legislators urged him to work with Congress toward enacting federal consumer privacy and data security legislation in 2022. The four lawmakers — U.S. Sens. Roger Wicker, R-Miss., and Marsha Blackburn, R-Tenn., and Reps. Cathy McMorris Rodgers, R-Wash., and Gus Bilirakis, R-Fla., urged Biden to prioritize data privacy legislation six months ago and said they have not received a response. They wrote a federal law is “a national imperative for maintaining a strong and secure digital economy.” Read More