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In the news...
- UK Starts Enforcing Online Age-Check Rules [techcrunch.com]
"A U.K. law requiring that pornography websites verify the age of their users took effect [last] Friday... to comply with the Online Safety Act," reports Anthony Ha. "The law also requires that online platforms prevent children from being exposed to harmful content, which is why sites like Reddit, Bluesky, X, and Grindr have also begun asking users in the U.K. to verify their age through means including selfies or government-issued IDs."
"This is just one of a number of new child protection laws that could normalize online age checks globally, according to Wired. The approach has been criticized by groups such as the Electronic Frontier Foundation as a threat to online privacy and anonymity — indeed, it’s worth noting that in a recent breach of the dating safety app Tea, many of the affected images were selfies and digital IDs uploaded for account verification."
- Minnesota Shooting Suspect Allegedly Used Data Broker Sites to Find Targets’ Addresses [wired.com]
The suspect in a high-profile shooting earlier this month may have gotten "[victims'] addresses or other personal details from online data broker services," court documents revealed. "According to an FBI affidavit, police searched the SUV believed to be the suspect's and found notebooks" listing the names and even addresses of many public officials, including those of his victims, along with a list of "mainstream search platforms for finding people's home addresses and other personal information, like phone numbers and relatives."
"Privacy and public safety advocates have long argued that the US should regulate data brokers to guarantee that people have better control over the sensitive information available about them. The US has no comprehensive data privacy legislation, and efforts to regulate data brokers from within federal agencies have largely been quashed." Read on to see what two cybersecurity and digital rights experts have to say.
- States Pass Privacy Laws To Protect Brain Data Collected by Devices
[newsfromthestates.com]
"Colorado, California, and Montana are among the states that have recently required safeguarding brain data collected by devices outside of medical settings. That includes headphones, earbuds, and other wearable consumer products that aim to improve sleep, focus, and aging by measuring electrical activity and sending the data to an app on users’ phones."
A report by the Neurorights Foundation "found that 29 of 30 companies" that sell readily available neurotech products "have access to brain data and 'provide no meaningful limitations to this access.' Almost all of them can share data with third parties." And "even though current devices gather relatively basic information like sleep states, advocates for brain data protection caution that future technologies...could extract more personal and sensitive information."
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