Mark Richards @markalanrichards@librem.one

Now we can't go out anymore, smartphones seem silly.

The ICO, UK's data protection regulator, failed its regulation: PECR (ePrivacy) and DPA (GDPR).

The failure as controller of Global Privacy Assembly's site, meant that without consent, Twitter effectively received a list of people interested in GPA.

Sites with Twitter feeds typically need informed cookie consent before being loaded. Don't take my word for it, you should get the same response if you now ask the ICO or read Twitter's terms.

https://eandt.theiet.org/content/articles/2020/03/data-privacy-group-found-to-have-breached-online-privacy-rules/

@vinnl @laura. It's hard to avoid Google if you have to use it for work single sign on, email, office tools, cloud services, etc. I'd love to get off Google, but nearly all work contracts I have done in the past 8 years have demanded I use it in some way, so getting off Facebook is easy, but realistically leaving Google is hard. I've cut down, but not out.

@srol unscrew parts you are comfortable removing, like maybe the boards, PSU, disks, etc and try giving them time to dry the other way up in case any water got inside, collected underneath them and maybe wipe down any surfaces. Failing that, turn the whole PC upside down for a period of drying.

Antibacterial soap is a good idea, but perhaps not a good product.

A notable problem with any severe infection, will be how the body copes if you have a secondary infection, so sure, the antibacterial agent might not do much with Coronavirus, but less bad bacteria might reduce further complications.

However, does the antibacterial agent work, or worse cause harm? Have a read around trusted sources and judge for yourself
https://www.fda.gov/consumers/consumer-updates/antibacterial-soap-you-can-skip-it-use-plain-soap-and-water

Governments should incentivise businesses, universities, workers and students to work from home this year.

Reducing social interactions this year might help slow infection rates of Coronavirus to rates hospital beds can handle.

Working from home also helps reduce pollution, traffic and long hours wasted commuting.

But business and workers might need some upgrades and motivation, so governments should incentivise them. A reward for each day worked without commuting: maybe $5/day?

@jpmens anyone with a reset password email, sent a bank statement by email or who's been asked to email a passport photo to verify identify should know metadata isn't as important as content.

@matt do they have trackers on online banking login pages? I found NatWest had included Facebook Pixel with no system controls to prevent Facebook siphoning every login if Facebook wanted to change its JavaScript to do this. Would Facebook do this? I guess unlikely, but it's a breach of security controls regulators should expect... NatWest removed the Pixel after my complaint. They kept it on pages that weren't for online banking.

@thegibson regulators being too soft... Maybe they suffer incompetence, negligence, corruption, starvation of resources or a misplaced focus on privacy only being an issue when financial damages can be identified. Whatever the case, their low activity means not only bad privacy, but the normalisation of unlawful corporate behaviour in any industry that can leverage misuse of personal data to develop an unfair market advantage (advertising, publishing, retail, software, ...)

@willghatch if it doesn't look right when you try it in real life, it probably isn't a good idea when you do it on a computer. Like having a vault secured only by a shared key everyone in the team has, running your operations on only free products being given out, ignoring contract terms, putting all your records in a free filing cabinet held by a startup with no obvious means to turn profit, letting an advertiser company sit at your reception desk and video everyone coming in.

@isagalaev @willghatch I'm sure too many companies have negligent intent, but when an executive does want to do things properly do they really stand a chance? Insecurity by default is the norm, anyone running a company as a CEO not only needs to be capable of picking out a CISO, CTO, etc who defy the norms, but for those they bring in to take that norm breaking behaviour down to the engineer and procurement levels.

@danny I'm guessing the hour long stream of House of Cards is improving the global GB/KWh, unless it's via satellite phone, for an outdoor cinema projector, operating on a cruise ship

@xj9 maybe - but companies should at least be held to account under existing law (I live in the EU so ePrivacy and GDPR). There is a wider problem of tracking in apps, OSes, IOT devices and pervasive tracking of WiFi, Bluetooth and facial recognition such browsers can't solve. Also, deceptive banners about cookies are commonplace, so risks apply to whitelisting too. Imagine you are told you are consenting to sex with someone, but they swap in someone else.

Code reviews are conversations between developers and code; not developers and authors. As authors we should consider ourselves a minority in the audience of future readers. Questions asked are for the whole team to think about, answers given for maintainers to look back on. Be considerate but don't expect a sociable chat: that's what grabbing a coffee is for.

Most UK local government councils are sharing personal data with advertisers, some for profit
https://eandt.theiet.org/content/articles/2019/11/96-of-councils-found-to-hand-over-users-data-to-marketing-firms/

Pre-checked cookie consent unlawful
https://thecloudlawyer.net/2019/10/16/are-your-cookies-from-planet-49/

opt-out consent is newspeak.
Consent is an act to agree to a future event.
In many websites, cookies are already sent by the time you see the opt-out, so if much of the cookie consent mechanisms were applied to sex; then we'd be calling it rape.

Privacy Badger complaining on the privacy regulator's site

British privacy regulator (ICO) breaches privacy (again)
https://markalanrichards.com/2019/10/08/British-privacy-regulator-breaches-privacy.html

Typical software development