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At airports across the U.S., Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA) agents confront flyers as they are boarding flights and ask to search carry-on items. These interactions are supposed to be consensual. But flyers often get the impression that they have no choice but to submit to a search. IJ currently has a class action lawsuit against the DEA and Transportation Security Administration (TSA) over their unconstitutional searches and seizures at U.S. airports. Learn more about IJ's work protecting America’s foundational rights—including the right to be secure from unreasonable searches and seizures: https://ij.org/issues/ijs-project-on-...

Since 2017, self-driving cars owned by Chinese companies have traversed 1.8 million miles of California alone, according to a Fortune analysis of the state's Department of Motor Vehicles data. As part of their basic functionality, these cars capture video of their surroundings and map the state's roads to within two centimeters of precision. Companies transfer that information from the cars to data centers, where they use it to train their self-driving systems. The cars are part of a state program that allows companies developing self-driving technology -- including Google-spinoff Waymo and Amazon-owned Zoox -- to test autonomous vehicles on public...

The Treasury Department banned the maker of spyware used to target government officials, reporters and activists, deploying “first-of-its-kind” sanctions against sellers of commercial spyware. The U.S. government deployed sanctions against Greece-based spyware vendor Intellexa on Tuesday and the company’s leadership after targeting U.S. officials. “Today’s actions represent a tangible step forward in discouraging the misuse of commercial surveillance tools, which increasingly present a security risk to the United States and our citizens,” Under Secretary of the Treasury for Terrorism and Financial Intelligence Brian E. Nelson said. The Treasury Department targeted two individuals and five entities associated with Intellexa for their...

A new national divide is emerging among states over whether to track sales by gun stores Should gun store sales get special credit card tracking? States split on mandating or prohibiting it. Beginning Monday, a California law will require credit card networks like Visa and Mastercard to provide banks with special retail codes that can be assigned to gun stores in order to track their sales. But new laws will do the exact opposite in Georgia, Iowa, Tennessee and Wyoming by banning the use of specific gun shop codes. The conflicting laws highlight what has quietly emerged as one of...

Records reveal that the U.S. Postal Service (USPS) has been sharing information from thousands of Americans’ letters and packages with law enforcement over the past decade. This practice, known as the “mail covers program,” involves conveying details from the outside of boxes and envelopes to federal agents and police officers without requiring a court order. Postal inspectors fulfill such requests primarily to aid in finding fugitives or investigating crimes. Notably, 97% of these requests were approved, covering days or weeks of mail sent to or from specific individuals or addresses.

Something very odd happened to me yesterday. I had noticed a mole on my back that concerned me and rather than wait a few weeks for an appointment, I dropped into my dermatologist for him to have a quick look. He gave me a name for it, "Seborrheic Keratoses", and said it benign and was nothing to worry about. He sent me off with a pamphlet about it. I had not done any searches online, for either skin cancer in general or for this specific lesion, not now or ever. I have watched cardio docs on Youtube, but it doesn't...

In Japan, “Johatsu” refers to people who disappear due to pressures like failed marriages, debt, and job loss. They abandon their lives and live anonymously off the grid. Specialized companies, called “night movers,” assist them in vanishing completely Behind the scenes, specialized businesses known as “yonige-ya” facilitate these disappearances. These “fly-by-night shops” provide services to Johatsu, helping them erase their existence. From creating new identities to arranging housing and employment, these discreet agencies operate in the shadows, ensuring their clients vanish without a trace.

Popular smartphone apps used to track people’s location and provide weather reports may hand over driving data to a firm that sells the information to insurance companies for the purposes of setting rates for unsuspecting motorists... apps Life360, MyRadar and Gas Buddy are providing user data to an Allstate-owned company, Arity, which computes the numbers to create a “driving score” that takes into account any risky behavior behind the wheel... That information is then sold to other insurance firms — with user consent — which set rates for their customers ... Life360, which is used by parents to keep track...

Adobe’s recent changes to its terms of service have indeed sparked concern among creators. When users opened Photoshop, they were greeted with a pop-up informing them of these adjustments. While it’s common for companies to update their terms of service, Adobe’s changes go beyond the usual permissions. Specifically, section 2.2 of the terms now grants Adobe the right to access content generated from its programs for various purposes, including training artificial intelligence (AI). Here’s a summary of the key points: Access to Your Content: Adobe’s updated terms of service allow them to access and view your content for various purposes,...

For comparison, the Morrison Police Department issued a total of 1,700 speeding citations in 2023.. MORRISON, Colo. — In its first two weeks, the Town of Morrison's new automated radar camera issued more than 10,000 tickets to speeding drivers, according to Morrison Police Chief Bill Vinelli. The camera is permanently stationed at Bear Creek Avenue and Mount Vernon Avenue. With a posted speed limit of 25 miles per hour along Bear Creek Avenue, the eastbound camera automatically captures the license plate of drivers going 35 mph or more.. ... Tickets are then mailed directly to drivers. The camera was installed...

States are seeking out ways to recoup losses from lost gas tax revenue. California, which relies on gas tax and other fuel tax revenues to support its roadway maintenance, is piloting the idea of a "road charge," which would charge drivers based on the number of miles they drive rather than how much gas they purchase. The pilot program was initiated due to the fact that the collection of gas tax revenue is estimated to decrease in the coming years, according to the California State Transportation Agency (CalSTA). CalSTA officials told FOX Business that a bill, signed in 2021, established...

In an interview with KrebsOnSecurity, the UMD team said they found that in addition to exposing Russian troop pre-deployment sites, the location data made it easy to see where devices in contested regions originated from. “This includes residential addresses throughout the world,” Levin said. “We even believe we can identify people who have joined the Ukraine Foreign Legion.” They also shared a written statement they received from Starlink, which acknowledged that Starlink User Terminal routers originally used a static BSSID/MAC ...Rye said Apple’s response addressed the most depressing aspect of their research: That there was previously no way for anyone...

Bing, Microsoft’s search engine, isn’t working properly right now. At first, we noticed it wasn’t possible to perform a web search at all. Now it seems search results are loading properly. But this outage also appears to still be affecting Bing’s application programming interface (API), which means that other services that rely on Bing aren’t working properly. For instance, DuckDuckGo and Ecosia, two alternative search engines that rely on Bing’s search results, aren’t returning any search results right now. Microsoft Copilot isn’t loading either. ChatGPT Plus subscribers, who have the ability to perform web searches, also get an error when...

We've all heard before that our cellphones are listening to us and monitoring our every move. While this has been debunked (or, at least, explained), the fact of the matter is that data tracking is standard practice by the most popular mobile carriers these days. **SNIP** If you don't want your mobile carrier to have so much overarching access to your data, there are ways you can stop them. The problem is that most mobile carriers aren't going to broadcast this information because it's beneficial for them to maintain this access. However, that's why we're here to help. Managing your...

Tesla and SpaceX CEO Elon Musk has once again targeted Microsoft Corporation (NASDAQ:MSFT) after a clip of Satya Nadella surfaced on social media talking about new AI capabilities in Windows PCs. What Happened: In an interview with Wall Street Journal which was made public on Monday, Nadella spoke about new AI capabilities of Microsoft’s Copilot+PCs with Qualcomm chips and AI Windows. One of the features was “Recall,” which enables Windows to take constant screenshots of the user’s screen and use a generative AI model to process the data, making it searchable. The clip from the video was shared by a...

REDMOND, Wash. (AP) — Microsoft wants laptop users to get so comfortable with its artificial intelligence chatbot that it will remember everything you’re doing on your computer and help figure out what you want to do next.The software giant on Monday revealed a new class of AI-imbued personal computers as it confronts heightened competition from Big Tech rivals in pitching generative AI technology that can compose documents, make images and serve as a lifelike personal assistant at work or home.

ransomnote: Transcript below.Click to view the 1 minute video on X (watermarked @tsarnick)May 20, 2024 TRANSCRIPT BEGINS~~~~~~~~~~Satya Nadella (CEO of Microsoft): How do we introduce memory,right?Photographic memory into what you do on the PCAnd now we have it. So it's called Recall.It's not keyword search.It's semantic search over all your history.And it's not just about any document, we can recreate moments from the past essentially.WSJ’s Joanna Stern (interviewer, provides demonstration): Here's how it works.Windows constantly takes screen shots of what's on your screen, then uses a generative AI model right on the device along with the NPU to process all...

In December 2022, Reason reported that both state and federal wildlife agents routinely trespass onto private land and plant cameras. Two Tennessee homeowners successfully sued the state over the practice, and a three-judge panel ruled in their favor. The state appealed the decision, and this week the court of appeals ruled in the homeowners' favor. At issue is a state law allowing officers of the Tennessee Wildlife Resource Agency (TWRA) to "go upon any property, outside of buildings, posted or otherwise," in order to "enforce all laws relating to wildlife." In the case of Terry Rainwaters and Hunter Hollingsworth, TWRA...

The FBI is at it again, going after US citizens with a little help from Speaker Johnson and the rest of Congress, who voted to extend the FBI’s 702 FISA powers. Remember, these are the same powers they used illegally against President Trump and his team without ever facing the consequences. Now, they’re back in action, ready to crank up the wiretaps, all thanks to our “captured” lawmakers. As a matter of fact, about 20 minutes before becoming Speaker, Mike Johnson was against the FBI’s warrantless wiretaps. But that stance took a quick turn after the feds got him alone...

New technologies that will make monitoring drivers' behavior easy and comprehensive … will soon also be mandatory.H.R. 3684, an “infrastructure” bill signed by Joe Biden in 2021 included a provision mandating expanded monitoring of folks as they drive an automobile. And henceforth the intrusive technologies will be required in all new vehicles being manufactured and sold in the U.S.New vehicles will be required to have passive monitoring systems to assess each driver’s behavior. An algorithm will determine if the driver is too impaired to operate the vehicle. If so, the vehicle will either be disabled, or some as yet unexplained...