Liberty News

For years, the media has hyped up the idea that Airbnbs may be dangerous and used by criminals. At some point, it's no wonder that the company would start to just cut off people with criminal records, because of the PR problems it causes. The company even went so far as to buy a background check company that it had used.

Either way, it seems clear that Airbnb is going too far in banning people like Hallam, but it really shouldn't be a surprise. If we keep pushing moral panic style stories about the dangers of criminals using services like Airbnb, we shouldn't then be surprised when the company says okay, no more people with a criminal record no matter how totally unfair that might be.

See full article from techdirt.com

Can't we find a way to recognise good people from bad? Are we paving the way for the acceptability of Chinese style social scoring?

Thousands of Xcel customers in Colorado were locked out of their 'smart' thermostats, meaning they had no control of the temperatures in their homes.

The thermostat displayed a message saying he could not turn up the cooling because he had been locked out due to an energy emergency.

The app users had signed up for a scheme whereby they receive discounts in exchange for volunteering for a personalised power cut when the electricity company is running out of capacity.

Xcel confirmed that some customers had been locked out of their thermostats for hours. Vice President of Customer Solutions and Innovation Emmett Romine said that the 22,000 customers who could not control their thermostats had registered for the Colorado AC Rewards program. He explained:

It's a voluntary program. Let's remember that this is something that customers choose to be a part of based on the incentives. For participating in the program, customers received $100 in credit and $25 annually.

He added that it was the first time in the six years since the program was launched that customers were not able to override their thermostats. He said there was an energy emergency caused by hot weather, heavy usage of air conditioners, and an unexpected outage in Pueblo.

Presumably the same sort of 'emergency override' capability is one of the reason that UK power companies are so keen on getting people to have 'smart' meters.

The World Economic Forum has made a big push for digital identity programs around the world

The article then states (without mentioning numbers) that consumers said they would pick banks and financial firms as the most trustworthy entities to create and maintain a system that controls their identities online.

The WEF write-up adds some doom-and-gloom scenarios and fear mongering into the mix, arguing that with economies around the world heading into high inflation and recession, and the trend likely to continue -- digital economy and its potential becomes more important than ever.

But -- unless there is a way to identify everybody online, the WEF warns that people will actually stop interacting online.

Internet censors of the Information Commissioner's Office has been called on to implement  a full-scale probe into how the online betting industry is exploiting new technology to profile and target gamblers.

The move follows a complaint by  the campiagn group Clean Up Gambling. It alleges that Sky Bet and its partners are creating detailed behavioural profiles of customers and sharing thousands of data points with dozens of third parties.

Clean Up Gambling alleges that one advertising partner, Signal, owned by TransUnion, has a dossier of 186 attributes for an individual, including their propensity to gamble, their favourite games and their susceptibility to specific types of marketing.

TransUnion said it assists gambling companies in preventing fraud, confirming age and identity, checking affordability and protecting vulnerable customers, to support responsible gambling.

Lucy D'Orsi, chief constable of the British Transport Police, says her force wants access to data from passengers' mobile phones and bank cards so that it can track us around the network. At the moment, you can get on a train from Wolverhampton to London with a paper ticket and leave little trace. The ticket itself can be tracked if it's put through the ticket barriers at a station that has them, but no rail company nor the British Transport Police can have any real idea who is travelling on that ticket, especially if it was bought with cash.

D'Orsi was quite open about the possibilities that would arise. She quoted the example of someone who was spotted by an algorithm travelling on the Tube for six hours and who, she suggested, might be a pickpocket or a predatory sex offender. She also quoted the example of someone who caught a train from London to Liverpool and then caught one back straight away. That's not normal, she said. That's not what people do. So why is someone doing that? In future, she suggested, British Transport Police would be able to pick them up as a suspected drug-dealer.

We are supposed to think, of course, that only criminals will be stopped. Except that there are very good reasons why we all sometimes find ourselves making unusual journeys. Next winter, I confidently predict, D'Orsi and her colleagues will find themselves feeling the collar of large numbers of poor people who are travelling the Tube to keep warm and save heating bills at home -- henceforth they are could be suspected pickpockets or predatory sex offenders. As for who would want to travel to Liverpool and straight back again, I can think of numerous reasons: a parent dropping off their children with grandparents or an ex-partner for the week; someone who started a journey to attend a business meeting only to receive a call en-route that it had been cancelled; someone meeting family or friends from abroad and is going with them for the journey. All these people are, apparently, in the eyes of British Transport Police, criminal suspects, designated as such by an algorithm.

The boss of WhatsApp says it will not lower the security of its messenger service. Will Cathcart told the BBC.

If asked by the government to weaken encryption, it would be very foolish to accept.

We continue to work with the tech sector to support the development of innovative technologies that protect public safety without compromising on privacy.

End-to-end encryption (E2EE) provides the most robust level of security, because - by design - only the intended recipient holds the key to decrypt the message, which is essential for private communication.

The technology underpins the online exchanges on apps including WhatsApp and Signal and - optionally - on Facebook messenger and Telegram. Only the sender and receiver can read those messages - not law enforcement or the technology giants.

The UK government wants phone software to scan people's phones for banned material prior to being encrypted for a message.

Cathcart explained:

Client-side scanning cannot work in practice. Because millions of people use WhatsApp to communicate across the world, it needs to maintain the same standards of privacy across every country.

If we had to lower security for the world, to accommodate the requirement in one country, that...would be very foolish for us to accept, making our product less desirable to 98% of our users because of the requirements from 2%.

What's being proposed is that we - either directly or indirectly through software - read everyone's messages. I don't think people want that.

Ella Jakubowska, policy adviser at campaign group European Digital Rights, said:

Client-side scanning is almost like putting spyware on every person's phone. It also creates a backdoor for malicious actors to have a way in to be able to see your messages.

Vodafone & Deutsche Telekom recently started trials with Trustpid to reintroduce persistent user tracking of their internet browsing with view to selling browsing history to advertisers.

Although Vodafone claims there is nothing to worry about, privacy officials are especially concerned about the recent involvement of network operators. Privacy advocates call it the return of the Super Cookie. This would be a massive step backward in creating an independent web where the privacy of internet users is respected.

With TrustPid, Vodafone assigns a fixed ID to a user based on someone's phone number. Website operators would then be able to call up this identifier to exactly see what websites this user has visited and create a profile to display targeted ads.

Recent privacy laws are currently challenging Google and Apple's current solutions for selling users' browser history to advertising. Many web browsers block third-party cookies, and even Google Chrome is phasing out third-party cookies next year. Apple is cracking down on user tracking, costing Facebook billions in revenue.

It has become more challenging to monetize customer data, so the advertising market is looking for new solutions to tap into. They do not want to go back to non-personalized advertising, so they are pushing the frontier to see what's still possible. The Trustpid trial is an example of this.

See further details from blog.simpleanalytics.com

The Chinese property sector has been struggling of late and some provincial banks have failed as a consequence. And people unable to withdraw or have lost their savings have unsurprisingly been protesting.

The Chinese authorities don't like their failures to be publicised so these protests have been very much frowned upon. And the authorities have found a novel way to silence the protestors before they can get started.

Authorities in the Chinese province of Henan are restricting the protestor's movements using the country's Covid app. Multiple protestors say they are being forced to quarantine, blocked from public transport or entering buildings.

Most appear to be customers of four rural banks which had run into difficulties providing cash withdrawals. The failing banks froze deposits, prompting angry demonstrations last month.

In China, residents use a health code app to enter buildings and shops, use public transport, or leave the city. Users must scan a QR code and show a colour-coded health status on their phone before entering. If this status turns red, it indicates the person has tested positive for Covid recently or is suspected to have Covid, and must be quarantined for 14 days.

Last week protestors found their status had turned red when they tried to enter train stations, buildings, or hotels.

One bank customer in Zhengzhou told BBC Chinese her status was red even though she had never been in contact with a confirmed case, and her most recent tests showed she was negative. She added that she was visited by health officials who asked her to stay at home and refused to explain why her status had suddenly turned red.

Warwickshire County Cricket Club

Warwickshire County Cricket Club has confirmed that snooping measures were brought in for Saturday's international T20 match at Edgbaston. The crowd will be surveilled by undercover football crowd-style spotters .

The move was in response to the recent test match where passage of play was marred by reports of racial insults from a section of the crowd. This subsequently led to a criminal investigation by West Midlands Police. Stuart Cain, Warwickshire's chief executive, said:

We cannot hide from the mindless racist abuse experienced by some fans following India in the Eric Hollies Stand.

For Saturday's T20 match, Warwickshire confirmed that undercover football crowd-style spotters would be deployed throughout Edgbaston to listen out for abusive behaviour and report it for immediate action, and added that there would be an increased police presence at games to handle such incidents swiftly, and enable more chance of successful prosecutions.

The club said that all fans at subsequent matches would be encouraged to report abuse via the Edgbaston app, adding that anyone found guilty of hate crime will be banned not only from Edgbaston but from all venues under the ECB's jurisdiction.

The club has not commented on what speech it considers to be worthy of punishment nor has it detailed whether people's conversation are being recorded in support its punishment regime.