Remember CAPPS II, the program for screening airline passengers by using databases of personal information? This program was scrapped because the Transportation Security Administration (TSA) of the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) was concerned that it posed an increasing threat to privacy and civil liberties. Replacing CAPPS II was the nicely-monikered “Secure Flight.” (EPIC’s website has a good […]
The Office of Legal Counsel (OLC) of the DOJ has issued a highly suspect interpretation of the original HIPAA that seriously undermines the enforceability of HIPAA. Some background: In 1996, Congress Passed the Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act (HIPAA). The Act, at 42 U.S.C. § 1320d-6, provided in part for the protection of medical privacy – […]
This interesting AP story demonstrates how illusory anonymity can be on the Internet:
I’m getting tired of posting about data security breaches, but this one is a whopper — actually, more like a double whopper. From the AP [link no longer available]:
A Washington Post article discusses the letter the FDIC recently mailed to about 6,000 of its employees that describes a data security breach where employee personal information was compromised:
The FTC just announced a settlement with BJ’s Wholesale Club, Inc. From the FTC press release:
From a recent survey: Nearly half of U.S. voters say they don’t shop online because they fear identity thieves may capture their bank-account information, according to a survey released on Wednesday by a technology-industry trade group. These fears are heightened because of the rash of security breaches in recent months. I previously posted about these breaches here and here.
An article discusses the courtship of Supreme Court clerks. Some firms are giving $150,000 signing bonuses.
A Washington Post article discusses the growing use of biometric identification, which involves authenticating identity by using immutable characteristics of the human body. Some methods include fingerprint readers, iris scanners, and facial recognition systems. According to the article:
There is still more interesting grist from the national telephone survey by the Annenberg Public Policy Center at the University of Pennsylvania. The report has an extensive discussion of price discrimination – offering different prices for the same product or service to different customers based on behavioral profiling. This practice is already happening. Supermarket discount cards are an example […]