How to stop Google from invading your privacy and others’ when you share links
“share.google” links are evil. Here’s how to get Google to stop spitting them at you.
Tag Archives: privacy
Another credit reporting agency breach, another terrible breach notification letter
TransUnion is bad at security and bad at handling security breaches and none of this is going to get better until we have a real federal data privacy law with meaningful penalties for companies which leak people’s data.
Thoughts on the proposed Massachusetts Data Privacy Act, S.2608
The proposed law is a good start but it has problems that should be fixed before it is enacted. Here are some of them.
Mar. 13 NPR “Consider This” talks about risks of DOGE data access, with cameo by me
NPR’s Ailsa Chang; Elizabeth Lair of the Equity and Civic Technology Project at the Center For Democracy and Technology; Jonathan Kamens, late of the Department of Veterans Affairs; and University of Virginia law professor Danielle Citron, talk about the risks of DOGE having access to federal government data and how the Privacy Act of 1974 is being used to push back on it.
Online privacy protection for people in the resistance: DeleteMe, Block Party
If you can make it go from taking 30 seconds to 30 minutes for a bad actor to find something private about you online, you’ll dramatically decrease the number of people willing to go through the effort. Think of it like putting an alarm-system sign on your lawn to encourage burglars to skip your house.
New Thunderbird extension: Addy.io / AnonAddy for Thunderbird
Now you can route your outbound emails through Addy.io and even generate new Addy.io aliases for that purpose without ever leaving Thunderbird.
Case study: anonymizing email addresses for online accounts
Why you might want to anonymize the email addresses for your online accounts, some techniques for how to do that, and the details of how I did it myself, including stats, stories, and scripts.
How to protect your anonymity online when the services you use could be breached
Twitter is in the news again with another security breach in which 235 million users’ email addresses, phone numbers, and Twitter handles were exposed. These seems like a good opportunity to talk about what you can / should do to protect yourself if you need to maintain anonymity online. The basic rule is this: if… Read More »
Why you probably shouldn’t use Express Scripts
My health insurance provider, Blue Cross Blue Shield of Massachusetts, currently uses Express Scripts as its mail-order pharmacy. They’re switching to CVS Caremark as of January 1, 2023, which as you’ll see from below is probably a good thing. However, if your insurance company is still using Express Scripts, then I to encourage you to… Read More »
United Airlines violates passenger privacy during chaotic boarding process
Flying on United wasn’t entirely bad, but poor policies and procedures or failures to follow them caused several problems that could have been avoided, including a violation of passenger privacy.