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FTC May Cast A Closer Eye On How Businesses Share Personal Data
Personal information shared by users with corporate websites is nothing new; you probably routinely log in to sites to which you've provided information about your age and location, or provided a credit card number in order to buy merchandise. At least sometimes, some of that information is shared in ways that the typical user would probably neither anticipate nor appreciate. David Vladeck, new head of the Federal Trade Commission's Bureau of Consumer Protection, has signaled recently that he's interested in tighter regulation of personal information shared online, even when it falls under the often-sweeping language of privacy agreements and sites' terms of use. An interview at the New York Times provides some insight into the regulatory environment that companies operating online may face in the course of the present administration — and it looks more stringent than online businesses have faced before, even while Vladeck shies away from saying that he supports "new rules."
Please show me your RFID passport, give your liquids to the nice man from the TSA, and tell me your social-security number so I can enter it into my laptop.
Better late than never... is what I'd like to say, but jeez! It's already 2009 and this security flaw is still un-patched! Hope they get past the "investigation" phase and on to the part where things get "fixed".
"Hi. We noticed that you've been buying a lot of condoms/birth control pills, lube and are not currently being treated for any STDs. Would you a like a free membership to our dating website?"
"Hi. We noticed that your spouse has been buying a lot of condoms/birth control pills, lube and motel rooms within 25 miles of your home. Can we interest you in our "Super Slueth" private investigation package?"
Yaddah yaddah.
"Common sense will be the death of us all"
Yeah, Linux works for all the rest of us. Every single one. You're the control group.
One place to start is to look at best practices of other governments.
I'm un-characteristically proud of what the government of Canada did in the Privacy Act, and the creation of the Office of the Privacy Commissioner.
Of course, it's not perfect, but It's pretty good. Especially compared to what I see in the rest of the world.
---
"I can't complain, but sometimes still do..." Joe Walsh
how they use linux without any drivers that work? I can't print a damn thing!
Notice the semantical difference between "I can not" and "it does not"?
Just over 200 days in, and Obama is already desperate enough to call people who ask their elected officials tough questions about health care "astroturfers." Is this the kind of change you were hoping for? Hope is for simple-minded idiots content with simple metaphors. It implies no useful action on your part, which is perfect for our increasingly intellectually-lazy and incurious society. Gee, forgive us Lord Obama for not taking you blindly at your word. Forgive us for wanting some actual details about the multi-thousand page boondoggles you're in so much of a hurry to ram through Congress without the kind of healthy and robust debate that the founders envisioned when they created the government. Forgive us for wanting more than just your usual vacuous platitudes. The MTV generation is not going to be able to bail your ass out of this one, mostly because they don't have enough of a dog in this fight to give a rat's ass like us working adults. And yes, we do look rather well-dressed for protesters - thanks for noticing. It's called "I work for a living and I buy my own God-damned clothes thank you very much."
Magic_Printer_Website
Politics is Treachery, Religion is Brainwashing
You must be new here; on Slashdot, we are all capable of installing Linux and getting a printer working without breaking a sweat. But we won't tell you how, because learning how to do figure it out yourself that is more important that just having us tell you what to do.
Palm trees and 8
I am here to report a broken link! The website you provided me does not work.
System specs:
Intel Core Duo 2.4GHz
1 GB RAM
OS: Microsoft Windows XP
You make a lot of hasty generalizations for a man who implies to be intellectual.
Bigot much?
install cups and foomatic filters and ghostscript-fonts, the open a terminal and do" sudo cupsd and then try that link again
Politics is Treachery, Religion is Brainwashing
Typical Alinski-disciple tactic - seek to discredit through mockery instead of addressing the facts, because for you to get bogged down in the facts would mean for you to be creamed. It should be noted that the "progressives" in Congress and the White House are using this very tactic right now, which the gpp actually complained about. Call me a bigot. I don't give a fuck. You see, I'm not a liberal, so my self-esteem is not predicated on how popular I perceive myself to be. In fact I am bigoted towards glassy-eyed Obama worshippers who would rather talk about Obama's golf swing or his wife's $400 sneakers than his cabinet full of ex-lobbyists or his extra-Constitutional 30+ "Czars", or his continuance of the warrantless domestic spying program, or his penchant for cramming through legislation without a healthy debate, or his wife who orchestrated a patient-dumping program at her hospital in Chicago.
Did you try adding more memory?
Mmm, pretty sure that's not going to work with his operating system ;-)
Are they looking into THAT collection of data?
oops, missed a few steps
remove windowsXP, install a complete GNU/Linux desktop including cups and foomatic filters and ghostscript-fonts, the open a terminal and do" sudo cupsd and then try that link again
Politics is Treachery, Religion is Brainwashing
And that is exactly why Microsoft is more popular than Linux.
Indeed. In fact, I was surprised to find that CUPS worked on my Mac. I guess it makes sense since OS X is UNIX-based, but still..
Well, let's start with the basics. Did you plug the goddamned printer in YOU MORON?!?!?!
(Lameness filter encountered. Post aborted! What idiots - I intended to shout!)
"Windows is like the faint smell of piss in a subway: it's there, and there's nothing you can do about it." - Charlie Br
"so my self-esteem is not predicated on how popular I perceive myself to be"
How commendable. I can relate to that. I could relate even more, if you were willing to sign your name, anonymous COWARD.
Meanwhile - I've downloaded the PDF containing the law being discussed everywhere. It is neither the abandonment of the elderly that Sarah Bigmouth Palin claims it to be, nor is it the end-all be-all cure for everything that ails us.
With 1018 pages, it's going to take some time to digest all of it, but so far, it looks like a reasoned attempt to save money - MY money, as much as anyone's money - while actually ensuring that just plain Po' Folk get treatment when they need it.
OF COURSE there are problems with it. But, it does attempt to address real problems with the existing system.
Now, take your bigoted ass down the road, BOY!
"Windows is like the faint smell of piss in a subway: it's there, and there's nothing you can do about it." - Charlie Br
This is window dressing and nothing more. Vladeck himself says he doesn't favor more legislation. This is theater of the absurd because the FTC cares about our privacy about as much as they do about spam.
You make a lot of hasty generalizations for a man who implies to be intellectual.
Bigot much?
flag@whitehouse.gov
Not much else needs to be said about Hopenchange. But I will anyway: the Stasi was run by Communists, too.
Don't you feel stupid now?
Wouldn't it be fun if that's how they taught you a new language in schools?
Hand you an English to Chinese dictionary (but without phonetics) and then punch you in the face whenever you made a mistake?
If "saving money" were really what the Obama takeover of healthcare is all about, why doesn't it include serious tort reform to remove the malpractice threat that drives so much overly-defensive medicine, driving up costs for everyone?
Probably because it's NOT really about containing costs...
You really need to read Section 1233 of that bill. Don't you find it a bit disconcerting that the government proposes to monetarily incentivize doctors to "discuss end-of-life planning"?
Especially coming from someone that up to the day he was elected was crowing about how 95% of the population would have their taxes cut? Now, the economy hasn't changed all that much since the election, so either Obama was lying about that tax cut or he was hopelessly naive. Take your pick, but either one doesn't deserve to have his power-grubbing fingers anywhere near the life-and-death decisions that individual health care boils down to.
Because when you get right down to it, the US health care industry isn't drive by government bureaucrats, it's driven by the collective weight of hundreds of millions of INDIVIDUAL decisions ABOUT PERSONAL HEALTH made by INDIVIDUALS each and every day.
Do you REALLY want the same government that gives us the TSA and warrentless wiretapping being responsible for those decisions?
REALLY?
Because that's what Obama's set out to do.
THINK it through. For YOURSELF.
Because if you really think that the poor in the US are actually denied health care, you're WRONG. Go to any hospital and find out for YOURSELF how many indigent patients there are receiving chemotherapy, heart surgery, transplants.
Because if you really think Canada has a better health system, go to Detroit and see how many Canadians are filling the health care system there.
Because if you really think Cuba has such a wonderful health care system, why don't you magically force all US residents to live on 1200 calories per day, remove all the cars from the country, and have all residents have to walk to work every day.
But of course, you first have to really THINK.
Are you up to it?
You must be new here; on Slashdot, we are all capable of installing Linux and getting a printer working without breaking a sweat. But we won't tell you how, because learning how to do figure it out yourself that is more important that just having us tell you what to do.
In other words, you don't know either.
Palm trees and 8
How you describe Obama fanatics (and equate that minority to all supporters or 'liberals/progressives') demonstrates just how bigoted and shallow your view of people is. Of course I will attack you if your blathering resembles blatant ignorance and intolerance.
Did you get a boner over Bush being a 'strong leader' while missing all his big muckups? Better yet, how great was it to watch John McCain sell his soul and backbone for GOP support and flip flop about 100x more than Kerry ever did?
But I"m not saying all conservatives are that naive... I'm not santa clause nor would I ever try to generalize such a large group of people so hastily and recklessly.
The great thing about publicly expressed opinion is that despite how little you care about how your message is received, other people DO care about how you deliver and what you've got to say. Subsequently you'll only be less and less credited as you show how foolish your view of the world is.
I am not too happy about Obama, either -- but thats not really cause to be a bigot. I definitely pay respect to conservatives that follow a more traditional feel like Ron Paul supporters.
Even if you're old, please grow up. Its kinda annoying telling adult-age people how to respect one another. Thanks.
Ahhh.. I see how you can be so blatant.. you post as an Anonymous Coward. Its nice that slashdot knows to call you out on that.
Put your name up. You talk tuff and boisterous when you've got a veil to hide behind.
pfft... you mean nothing.
Still a coward. I won't even read your posts you worthless bag of bigot garbage. Put your name up or be ignored.
1. My sarcasm meter is working fine. Slashdot is just not a good conductor of sarcasm.
2. If he's a troll, why didn't they mod him troll instead of flamebait?
But that wasn't why I replied the way I did. I'm just really sensitive to people replying to questions with something that isn't even an attempt at an answer. And what drives me even more crazy than that is when they reply to an answer with a link to a Google search that supposedly will return the answer. As if we're just all supposed to depend on Google instead of a forum dedicated to the subject at hand. And you got modded Informative without actually providing any information. That's something other than sarcasm.
If you understood communism you wouldn't look so stupid.
Sorry if this seems like flamebait, but this anonymous coward obviously doesn't know what he's talking about.
I can't talk to an idiot who doesn't know the meanings of words he even says.
What's more Apple owns it.
Mod points: Guaranteed to remove your sense of humor.
Side effects may include gullibility and temporary retardation
Bigoted? So let me get this straight... In your mind, disagreement == bigoted. You are either very ignorant, or very disingenuous. You sound like Nancy Pelosi and Harry Reid calling everyone who disagrees with them "un-American." Excuse me, but isn't this the same kind of shit you pussies were shrieking about during the Bush years? I thought that dissent was patriotic! Fucking hypocritical pussy. You only like the 1st Amendment when it suits your own ends, I guess...
Bigoted? So let me get this straight... In your mind, disagreement == bigoted. ...
You're giving joocemann the moron WAY too much credit when you use those words.
Read this before you read that healthcare bill.
Ad hominem argument is most commonly used to refer specifically to the ad hominem abusive, or argumentum ad personam, which consists of criticizing or attacking the person who proposed the argument (personal attack) in an attempt to discredit the argument. It is also used when an opponent is unable to find fault with an argument, yet for various reasons, the opponent disagrees with it.
Amazingly, that Wiki article predates your purveying of logical fallacies. That article looks like it was written with YOU in mind, doesn't it? Don't you just hate it when Wikipedia is prescient and makes you look downright stupid?
Sadly enough, I bet you really do think you're smart. I guess you've fallen under the Dunning-Kruger effect, eh? The phrase "...people reach erroneous conclusions and make unfortunate choices but their incompetence robs them of the metacognitive ability to realize it" fits you perfectly.
Publius would be so proud!
argumentum ad hominem
So, when your parents named you Joocemann, were you names after a relative, or was this a new name for the family? Also, is the legal spelling Jooce Mann, Jooecem Ann, or some other combination?
Oh, no! Worry about the corporations. They might spam you, have telemarketers call you or put you on a junk snail mail list.
How about legislation that stops government agencies from spying on its own citizens?
How about legislation that ends National Security Letters, instruments which destroy free speech and habeas corpus?
How about legislation that pulls the army out of Iraq, Afghanistan and Pakistan?
How about legislation that shuts down Bagram Air Base where people are still being tortured?
Nah, don't worry about that. Some corporation wants to sell you something and might buy your data to do it, and we can't have that because all corporations = bad, right? Wrong. The crimes of a few do not equal the crimes of the many. For every scumbag corporation out there, there are a thousand that do exactly what they're supposed to do. And yet, no one wants to recognize this, especially when there are much more pressing issue to think about.
I find it funny that privacy is such an issue for some now and yet many are the same people that want universal health care. Expect things to be much, much worse under any universal health care program.
I'm so proud!
Is this what passes for a counter argument now days?
Anon: 1, Jooce: 0
With 1018 pages, it's going to take some time to digest all of it, but so far, it looks like a reasoned attempt to save money - MY money, as much as anyone's money - while actually ensuring that just plain Po' Folk get treatment when they need it.
Thank you. You have just now proven yourself to be a far more responsible citizen than those fearful dickbites in congress who overwhelmingly passed the usa parrot act without even opening the fucking (literally) pages.
I routinely add a "Rm" or "Ste" number to my mailing address so I can track whether a business gives out my personal information. I've busted several mail-order catalogs. However, my contrived address is not strictly a valid USPS address.
Part of the solution should involve requiring businesses to persist definite "UserData" records so consumers can track transit of their data.
Because when you get right down to it, the US health care industry isn't drive by government bureaucrats, it's driven by the collective weight of hundreds of millions of INDIVIDUAL decisions ABOUT PERSONAL HEALTH made by INDIVIDUALS each and every day.
Jesus Christ -- my first real-life shrieking astroturfer. Good God -- how deep is the depression on your caps key? It sure gets a lot of use on slashdot.
Do you REALLY want the same government that gives us the TSA and warrentless wiretapping being responsible for those decisions?
Aha! The true silliness and ignorance of the asroturfer revealed. Obama had nothing to do with the TSA or warrantless wiretapping. Nor the usa parrot act, for that matter. Lay all that steaming fetid shit at the feet of the previous monomaniacal son of a bitch to reside in the White House. Goddamned fucking born-with-a-silver-spoon-up-his-ass pseudo-cowboy cracker.
Yes.. Ad Hominem... what you've been doing since your first post.
stfu child. your mouth gets bigger with every scoop from the silver spoon.
And yes, we do look rather well-dressed for protesters - thanks for noticing. It's called "I work for a living and I buy my own God-damned clothes thank you very much."
Typical raucous fucking bastard astroturfer. Fuck yourself in your stone heart.