---------------------------------------------------------------------- Message-ID: <07C6A241-05A6-4DB5-8EEB-0E303D337279@roscom.com> Date: Wed, 6 Sep 2017 11:49:21 -0400 From: Monty Solomon <monty@roscom.com> Subject: FTC settles with Lenovo over a built-in snooping software, $3.5 million fine FTC settles with Lenovo over a built-in snooping software, $3.5 million fine SAN FRANCISCO - Lenovo, the world's second largest computer manufacturer, has settled with the Federal Trade Commission over charges it shipped some of its laptops preloaded with software that compromised security protections in order to deliver ads to consumers. The company will also pay $3.5 million to 32 states that were part of the settlement. The VisualDiscovery program caused pop-up ads to appear on the user's screen whenever his or her cursor hovered over a similar-looking product on a website. While only information about websites the user visited was transmitted, the program had the ability to access all of a consumer's sensitive personal information transmitted over the Internet, including login credentials, Social Security numbers, medical information, and financial and payment information, the FTC alleged. https://www.usatoday.com/story/tech/2017/09/05/ftc-settles-lenovo-over-built-snooping-software-scanned-users-computers/632775001/ ------------------------------ Message-ID: <54B8225F-D395-49EF-8B8F-1F1B29F255B2@roscom.com> Date: Tue, 5 Sep 2017 00:15:14 -0400 From: Monty Solomon <monty@roscom.com> Subject: (OPINION) Shaheen: The Russian Company That Is a Danger to Our Security Shaheen: The Russian Company That Is a Danger to Our Security By Jeanne Shaheen Kaspersky Lab, the cybersecurity company, is close to Putin's government. So why is the U.S. government using its software? MADBURY, N.H. - The Kremlin hacked our presidential election, is waging a cyberwar against our NATO allies and is probing opportunities to use similar tactics against democracies worldwide. Why then are federal agencies, local and state governments and millions of Americans unwittingly inviting this threat into their cyber networks and secure spaces? That threat is posed by antivirus and security software products created by Kaspersky Lab, a Moscow-based company with extensive ties to Russian intelligence. To close this alarming national security vulnerability, I am advancing bipartisan legislation to prohibit the federal government from using Kaspersky Lab software. https://www.nytimes.com/2017/09/04/opinion/kapersky-russia-cybersecurity.html ***** Moderator's Note ***** Oh, here we go again: every time ordinary people get close to the curtain which separqates them from the ruling class, there is yet-another alarming emergency which compels us to assemble in formation, dress right, and march off to keep the world safe from communism. Bill Horne Moderator ------------------------------ Message-ID: <A66AA8D0-9656-456A-ABF4-39D07AFF84BD@roscom.com> Date: Tue, 5 Sep 2017 09:20:51 -0400 From: Monty Solomon <monty@roscom.com> Subject: Verizon Wants to Build an Advertising Juggernaut. It Needs Your Data First Verizon Wants to Build an Advertising Juggernaut. It Needs Your Data First A new Verizon Communications Inc. rewards program, "Verizon Up", provides credits that wireless subscribers can use for concert tickets, movie premieres and phone upgrades. But it comes with a catch: Customers must give the carrier access to their web-browsing history, app usage and location data, which Verizon says it uses to personalize the rewards and deliver targeted advertising as its customers browse the web. http://www.foxbusiness.com/features/2017/09/05/verizon-wants-to-build-advertising-juggernaut-it-needs-your-data-first.html ------------------------------ Message-ID: <91cecdbd-b227-4c6e-8830-72c83f5f3930@googlegroups.com> Date: Tue, 5 Sep 2017 14:17:23 -0700 (PDT) From: HAncock4 <withheld@invalid.telecom-digest.org> Subject: Re: Clevelanders file FCC complaint accusing AT&T of denying high-speed internet access to poor neighborhoods On Sunday, August 27, 2017 at 2:50:41 PM UTC-4, Bill Horne wrote: > CLEVELAND, Ohio -- Three Cleveland women have filed an FCC complaint > against AT&T, saying the telecommunications company is denying poor, > black neighborhoods in Cleveland the same high-speed internet services > that it provides to more well-off portions of the city and surrounding > suburbs. Just to show some contrast, below is a link to an advertisement AT&T proudly placed in LIFE magazine some 65 years ago. Back then, the old Bell System was proud of its community service.(LIFE 4/7/1952) https://books.google.com/books?id=ElYEAAAAMBAJ&lpg=PP1&dq=life%20april%203%2C%201952&pg=PA3#v=onepage&q&f=false (you may scroll through the rest of the issue.) ***** Moderator's Note ***** Readers please note that the "old" AT&T is *NOT* the same company which currently operates under the "AT&T" trademark. Bill Horne Moderator ------------------------------ Message-ID: <oopbtm$1dbv$1@grapevine.csail.mit.edu> Date: Wed, 6 Sep 2017 17:40:06 +0000 (UTC) From: wollman@bimajority.org (Garrett Wollman) Subject: Re: Texans' do-it-ourselves rescue effort defines Hurricane Harvey In article <20170906033321.GC6768@telecom.csail.mit.edu>, Bill Horne <bill@horneQRM.net> wrote: >the insurance, or tell them to go to higher ground. Those who choose >to remain in the flood plain would have the option of paying full- >price for the insurance, or of constructing homes which are much less >likely to be damaged by a flood, thereby justifying substantial >discounts. There's historical precedent for this, in South Texas even. all the homes in my parents' neighborhood (on the mainland but in Galveston County) that had to be rebuilt after the last major hurricane are constructed on pilings at least 10 feet above ground level. This is to protect them from storm surge-driven beach overwash; they can still have some ground-level structures, like garages, but they have to be constructed to break away in a storm rather than transferring the force of the seawater onto the pilings. Their A/C condensers sit on platforms hanging off the back of the house. -GAWollman -- Garrett A. Wollman | "Act to avoid constraining the future; if you can, wollman@bimajority.org| act to remove constraint from the future. This is Opinions not shared by| a thing you can do, are able to do, to do together." my employers. | - Graydon Saunders, _A Succession of Bad Days_ (2015) ------------------------------ ********************************************* End of telecom Digest Thu, 07 Sep 2017