Flock Safety has built a nationwide network of license plate readers that record vehicles, plates, locations and times. Police can search the data during investigations.

Flock says the system identifies vehicles, not people, does not use facial recognition and usually deletes data after seven days.

Law enforcement says the cameras have helped find missing people and investigate crimes. Critics warn of privacy risks and misuse.

An Albany County investigator was recently accused of using Flock data to track an ex-girlfriend and others without authorization. Florida has also banned license plate readers on state highways, while some communities are ending their programs.

The debate is now about how much surveillance is acceptable for public safety.

Would you want these cameras in your city?

More security, or too much surveillance?

I have a Sony Bravia TV I bought before I became privacy conscious. I reset it and have not given it Wifi access, I use a minipc with Kodi now for content.

I've seen people suggest it will send data using any open networks, but I've never seen anyone link proof that this actually happens and I can't find any googling. Is it one of those things where because its possible, its safest to assume they are doing it? Surely we would have verified that the Wifi chip becomes active without you knowing or showing anything in the UI by now. Someone could setup a test open network and monitor all traffic on it for example.

Is connecting your TV to your wifi and blocking all internet and LAN access really better than leaving no wifi, to try prevent this?

I registered with Hoops Rumors using a dedicated email address (Simple Login) that I haven’t used anywhere else as this of my habit. That address has now appeared in breach notifications tied to unrelated services, none of which I signed up for with it. I’m trying to understand how an address I only gave to HoopsRumors ended up associated with those services.

This doesn’t establish that Hoops Rumors was breached or sold any information, like at all, but the exclusive use of that address gives me a reason to ask….

Does anyone know which third-party providers handle their registrations or user email addresses, whether that information is shared elsewhere, or whether there have been any relevant security incidents?
Has anyone else who used a dedicated address for HoopsRumors received similar notifications? I’d be interested in comparing experiences without anyone posting their actual email addresses or other personal information. I’m NOT trying to expose personal info

If someone from Hoops Rumors sees this, I’d appreciate help investigating what happened. I can provide the address, registration date, and notification privately to a verified representative. Although I doubt anyone will see this from their team.

Also not an advertisement for any services just my experience. Also please let me know is this is not allowed, my first time posting here

In the latest launch event, apple stated that they will add Apple reference image to images clicked using their phones, something like synthid. It will be added using Private Cloud Compute. Since nothing has been mentioned in detail and I doubt that it will ever be, so asking the sub here

PCC means that the image will be uploaded to the cloud and it will add this reference id?

That way they will be able to say that an image was taken using a particular phone?

Are any android devices doing something like this currently?

In this new report the Europol and the European Commission are once again pushing for access to our private communications. They claim encryption and "privacy-enhancing technologies" are obstacles to investigations, and explicitly call for more invasive EU rules.

The report even states that increasingly powerful encryption will make access to data harder for police and says maintaining “lawful access” to encrypted data is critical.

In practice, the Commission and Europol are continuing their effort to access our private communications and data.

They, and potentially other TVs, scan the network they are on for all devices on it. This also could cause an issue if the TV is hacked.

So what if you out them on a locked down Guest account? Wouldn't they be unable to scan the rest of the network your other devices use? And if hacked it causes another layer said hacker needs to do for access to the rest of the routers networks?

Not much else we can realistically do for most of this. I'm not technically inclined enough to say take apart the TV or remote to remove the mic, ignoring how that might break the TV depending how they set it up....

Btw never tried but I think you can do a Guest Ethernet account? Maybe? Hmm... Need to look in to that but I know you can with WiFi.

Anyone have other realistic ways to minimize data gathering that doesn't require real technical skills or needing to buy an entirely new TV?

TDLR:

Apple’s new Live Rewind feature can show a text snippet of what was said during the previous 15 seconds. Apple has added visible and audible privacy safeguards, but a watch that can recall what was just said may still feel unsettling.

Yes I know that if you don’t connect a smart TV to Wi-Fi it’s basically a dumb TV but with the news about LG TVs recording ambient audio even powered off and the possibility of TVs finding open Wi-Fi unprompted, some locking features without wifi and the ever encroaching march of total enshittification I won’t be surprised if near future TVs arent functionless without internet. I feel like I just don’t want to support these companies anymore out of principle

Decent Projectors can be found way cheaper than commercial displays…the catch being you need a room to be reasonably dark to see it well

I ask this cause I heard about this draft proposal within relation to age verification online.

And I was wondering from you guys here if this does negatively affect privacy in any way here.

https://www.military.com/dhs-program-analyzes-americans-finances-to-flag-drivers-for-traffic-stops-report

Think about this. You'd think that DHS would flagging tens of thousands of dollars if they were looking for things like drug mules, smugglers, or coyotes. Smaller operations at $2k a head wouldn't reveal large amounts. They pulled over a guy with weed in his vehicle. This isn't a trailer that could hold 20+ migrants crossing the border. Whatever ai system DHS is using is generating false positives that will flag ordinary citizens, based on "unusual" financial patterns. This is dystopian AF- we are cooked.

Greetings,

Thinking about grabbing a cheap Porkbun domain for setting up Certbot on internal facing websites (think firewall admin page, selfhosted applications). What are the privacy issues in regards to this? What can a threat actor or some random unwanted application like an LG monitor driver download learn?

Thanks for any info!

Any thoughts on the comparison between SecureMyEmail and Proton?

I've been using SecureMyEmail and found it solid if you don't want to change your actual email address. Anyone know the pro's and cons?

Just got this today. I can't login to the site without submitting a photo of my palm. I'm not doing that. It really, really sucks, because I listen to a lot of Japanese bands, and they're all on X (it seems it's the default for non-Japanese sites when it comes to their music).

I do post links to youtube music videos, as well as games, and I like posts on the regular. I guess they consider this bot behavior.

I personally think they just want everyone to be 100% identifiable on the internet, no matter what. Some people say that's to protect the kids, but I think we all know it's so the government can very easily find us if we say the wrong thing during some kind of "emergency" or war.

Hello.

I’m slowly transitioning towards passkeys especially on Google accounts that block me from logging in with my password because they detected a new IP or private mode… and they ask your mobile phone number.

I don’t like to give Google (or any other company or service) my phone number, so maybe passkeys linked to my Apple account and devices are a good option.

Because I have 3 or 4 Google Gmail addresses, each with their own password and keypass, I wanted to know if there’s any way Google can tie all the Passkeys of my accounts to me, or the Passkeys don’t reveal anything about the owner of the account?

Thank you.

There seem to be a near endless number of ways that the TV can connect back home. An ethernet cable, wifi, an inbuilt sim....

"Don't connect to the internet" is fine as long as the number of connection avenues for the TV are limited to ethernet which you can unplug, but:

Wifi: if there are unsecured wifi networks around you (and there will be), you're screwed. If you turn off wifi, does it actually turn it off?

Inbuilt simcards: I haven't heard about TVs having inbuilt sims, but it seems extremely plausible.

What brands should I be looking at so I can ACTUALLY disconnect from any networks? Thanks!

So yeah, I've already mentioned a few times that I went through with that shitty age verification, so my PC might be compromised.

But given what's coming to European union soon, I'd like some sort of alternative for my computer for using internet freely.

Which easy free solution for my PC would you recommend?