Alex stamos

Cat Zakrzewski, The Washington Post Published 6:43 am PDT, Thursday, March 28, 2019 SAN FRANCISCO - Executives from top tech companies and California's attorney general aren't waiting for Washington to take action on pressing tech policy issues. At the first Technology 202 Live event here in San Francisco, they described how companies themselves are making changes to their own platforms to address public pressure on privacy and curbing disinformation on their platforms - and how states are seeking to rein in the tech giants with new legislation. "When it comes to the federal government, they move a lot slower," said California state attorney general Xavier Becerra. Here are some highlights: 1. The next time a public official - perhaps even a president - tweets something that violates Twitter's standards, the message could be accompanied by a label that provides more context, Twitter's Vajaya Gadde told my colleague Elizabeth Dwoskin. Twitter is exploring how to annotate … [Read more...] about The Technology 202: Silicon Valley isn’t waiting for Washington to address privacy, disinformation

confirming that it was subject to a major security breach, Yahoo was back in the news on Tuesday for a similar but also different matter: According to a new report from Reuters, the tech company scanned all of its users incoming emails for certain keywords that United States intelligence agencies asked them to look for. While the National Security agency was revealed to have access to the average person’s emails in the Edward Snowden leaks, they were usually collected in bulk and then searched on the NSA’s end. Under the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act, U.S. intelligence can request customer data to stop terrorist attacks among other reasons.While the keywords themselves were not revealed, this is the first time that an internet communication company was outed as searching all of its customers’ correspondence, as opposed to just a chunk or the NSA getting the information and searching it themselves. It’s not yet clear if any other email providers did … [Read more...] about Yahoo Reportedly Scanned Millions of Customers’ Emails On Behalf of U.S. Intelligence

Yesterday, May 15th, the U.S. Senate Permanent Subcommittee on Investigations held a hearing on “Online Advertising and Hidden Hazards to Consumer Security and Data Privacy.”  The hearing was based on a year-long investigation into a broader set of issues related to consumer privacy and security on the Internet, which narrowed over time to focus specifically on the online advertising industry and the problem posed by “malvertising,” or advertisement-based malware, which cybercriminals can use to target consumers through online advertising.The hearing was accompanied by a report jointly authored by Subcommittee Chairman Carl Levin and Ranking Member John McCain.  The report, which focused on the problem of malvertising, highlighted recent malware attacks channeled through well-known websites such as YouTube (owned by Google) and Yahoo!.  The report presented four major recommendations for limiting the risk to consumers posed by … [Read more...] about Senate Subcommittee Examines Online Advertising and Security

Aug 22, 1:02 AM EDT Newsletter Signup BusinessTechnologyWorldNationalMedia & CultureOpinionSportsLuxury Technology By Nina Godlewski @NinaGodlewski 04/27/17 AT 5:07 PM Months after the presidential election in the United States and weeks away from a runoff election in France, Facebook has released a report on misinformation campaigns that have flooded the site.The report from Facebook’s security team was released Thursday and details a plan to combat misinformation campaigns in the future. Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg wrote a letter to users in February in which he outlined his vision for the site in the coming months.Read: Facebook Responds To Live Video Of Killing, Allegedly Of 19-Year-Old Serena McKay MurderHis goals revolved around security, strengthening and bettering the community, and artificial intelligence. Thursday’s report addresses the security concerns as well as ways to strengthen and better the site’s community and the dialogues that … [Read more...] about Facebook Security Report: Social Media Site Unveils Plan For Fighting Fake News, Addressing Other Concerns

Google announced Thursday it had disabled dozens of YouTube channels and other accounts linked to a state-run Iranian broadcaster for a political influence campaign.The security firm FireEye, which alerted tech companies to some of the suspicious activity, said in a report this week that the overall operation originates from Iran and promotes Iranian interests to audiences in the U.S. and elsewhere.Google said its own forensic research shows the accounts were set up by people associated with the state-run Islamic Republic of Iran Broadcasting, or IRIB.The broadcaster didn't immediately respond to an emailed request for comment Thursday. FireEye said it's a sign that it's no longer just Russia conducting disguised political influence campaigns.On Tuesday, Facebook — which also works with FireEye — revealed that it had removed 652 suspicious pages, groups and accounts linked to Russia and Iran. Twitter made a similar announcement shortly thereafter.Tech companies have become … [Read more...] about Google takes on alleged Iranian influence campaign