Tuesday, September 03, 2019


Should this be kept double secret?
Concerns Mount as Israel Eases Rules on Cyber Weapons for Cyber Espionage
Israel’s Defense Ministry is easing its rules on the marketing and export of both offensive and defensive cyber weapons, and that is causing consternation amongst global cyber security experts and human rights groups. In the past, Israel has been much more deliberate about whom it sells cyber weapons, but that policy is now changing as Israel looks to become a much bigger player in the global market for cyber weapons exports.
… Some global cyber security experts predict that Israel could widen its sale of cyber weapons to non-state actors in foreign countries, including both private companies and unofficial hacker groups. That could significantly raise the stakes in modern cyber warfare. At a time when nations such as the U.S. are already boosting their offensive cyber capabilities, the real risk here is that offensive cyber weapons could fall into the wrong hands and set off a global cyber conflict.




Will we see a flood of lawsuits?
From Papers, Please!
By a vote of 9 to 4, the 3rd Circuit Court of Appeals has found that TSA checkpoint staff are “officers or employees” of the Federal government who “execute searches… for violations of Federal law”, and therefore that the US government is subject to private lawsuits for damages for certain intentional torts by TSA “screeners” including “assault, battery, false imprisonment, false arrest, [and] malicious prosecution.”
The decision by the judges of the 3rd Circuit following rehearing en banc in the case of Pellegrino v. TSA reverses an earlier decision by a three-judge panel that would have given impunity to checkpoint staff for even the most egregious violations of travelers rights.
Read more on Papers, Please!




Do you specify what is covered, or do you accept the prepackaged version?
Cyber Insurance: You Get What You Pay For
… When you sign up for insurance, you expect that it will cover all reasonable risk. That’s the assumption that the FM Global study proceeds from.
FM Global surveyed 105 CFOs at enterprise-scale companies with annual revenue of at least $1 billion. 71% in total felt that they were adequately covered in the event of a cybersecurity incident. 45% expected their cyber insurance provider to cover most of their losses in the result of a breach, and 26% expected the provider to cover their losses in full.
That isn’t the way most cyber insurance policies are drafted, however. FM Global’s research indicates that many of the costs associated with a breach are not commonly covered by typical cyber insurance policies. Most policies usually cover customer notification costs, costs from litigation, the cost of a replacement computer system and possibly ransomware payments.
There are many more cyber breach expenses that they do not tend to cover, however: any associated loss of revenue after normal operations are restored, regulatory compliance costs, drops in share price and market share, damage to the company brand, and loss of investment opportunities.




Failure to communicate or classic overreaction? Protocol with no process for false alarm?
Loveland High School student suspended after Safe2Tell tip even though police cleared him
A Loveland mom is taking issue with Loveland High School protocols after son was flagged in a Safe2Tell tip on Tuesday.
Justine Myers' son, a junior, was barred from class Wednesday after a Safe2Tell tip came in about a video he posted on Snapchat.
Myers said she picked up her son, Nate, 16, early from school Tuesday to go shooting at the range for some mother-son bonding. Before they left, Nate posted a video on Snapchat showcasing some of the guns. The two drove up to the mountains and were out of cell range for a while.
When they came back down, Myers said, she had several missed calls, texts and voicemails from her ex-husband. The police had shown up at his house, asking for Nate.
Someone had reported the Snapchat video to the Safe2Tell hotline.
Myers said her ex-husband and Nate’s sister explained to police where he was and what he was doing, and, Myers said, police agreed it was a misunderstanding.
“By the time we got home, we thought it was completely done,” Myers said. “Wednesday morning came and I received a voicemail saying my son was not allowed to be on school campus.”
Myers said she tried to explain that police had cleared him, but the school told her it had to follow protocol.
Myers and Nate attended a hearing on Thursday with district officials.
We walked in and they had his school work,” Myers said. “The hearing was scheduled for an hour, but it lasted about five minutes.”
They warned Nate about posting things on social media, Myers said.
Then, she said, school officials told him he could go back to class.




Should all parents ask to view all photos and video at least once a year? What did the school miss?
With more and more schools unfortunately deciding to put students under video surveillance in the name of alleged security, it might be smart for parents to know more about who can access those videos and under what conditions. Rick Wagner reports:
Should a parent have the right to view a public school surveillance photo or video of their child taken on a school bus or school property.
According to a new state law, the answer if yes if the photo or video is on a bus, but only if viewing it doesn’t violate other students’ federal privacy rights under the Family Educational Rights and Privacy Act. Kingsport City Schools is amending a policy to reflect the new law but doesn’t have a policy addressing other images or videos made by the school system.
Read more on Times News.




Worth reading.
Behind the Rise of China's Facial-Recognition Giants
Unfamiliar faces aren’t welcome at Beijing public housing projects. To prevent illegal subletting, many have facial recognition systems that allow entry only to residents and certain delivery staff, according to state news agency Xinhua. Each of the city’s 59 public housing sites is due to have the technology by year’s end.




It’s good to be the boss?
Your boss is going to start using AI to monitor you—and labor laws aren’t ready
Science fiction has long imagined a future in which humans constantly interact with robots and intelligent machines. This future is already happening in warehouses and manufacturing businesses. Other workers use virtual or augmented reality as part of their employment training, to assist them in performing their job or to interact with clients. And lots of workers are under automated surveillance from their employers.
All that automation yields data that can be used to analyze workers’ performance. Those analyses, whether done by humans or software programs, may affect who is hired, fired, promoted and given raises. Some artificial intelligence programs can mine and manipulate the data to predict future actions, such as who is likely to quit their job, or to diagnose medical conditions.
If your job doesn’t currently involve these types of technologies, it likely will in the very near future. This worries mea labor and employment law scholar who researches the role of technology in the workplace —because unless significant changes are made to American workplace laws, these sorts of surveillance and privacy invasions will be perfectly legal.




Trust and fake news.
Secret Memos Show the Government Has Been Lying About Backpage All Along
Sealed memos fought over in federal court last week show authorities have known for years that claims about Backpage were bogus.




Perspective.
Hong Kong Protestors Using Mesh Messaging App China Can't Block: Usage Up 3685%
How do you communicate when the government censors the internet? With a peer-to-peer mesh broadcasting network that doesn't use the internet.
And it's led to swift growth for Bridgefy: downloads are up almost 4,000% over the past 60 days, according to Apptopia estimates (Apptopia is an app metrics company).
The app can connect people via standard Bluetooth across an entire city, thanks to a mesh network. Chatting is speediest with people who are close, of course, within a hundred meters (330 feet), but you can also chat with people who are farther away. Your messages will simply "hop" via other Bridgefy users' phones until they find your intended target.
While you can chat privately with contacts, you can also broadcast to anyone within range, even if they are not a contact.




I too am a huge fan of Excel.
An Ode to Excel: 34 Years of Magic
In an age where “software is eating the world”, what can we learn from the tool that has withstood the test of time? This piece illustrates how the fundamentals behind Excel can be used to envision the next wave of bulletproof technologies.



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