Internet Service providers in Privacy Row
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other press 
Thursday March 06, 2008 00:44
by Pollytix
'The problem for the senior vice-president of technology at Phorm, an Aim-listed company which recently tied up a deal with the UK's three biggest internet service providers - BT, Virgin Media and TalkTalk, who between them have more than 10 million customers - is that it's not the privacy groups who he really needs to convince. It's the millions of people whose services will be affected by Phorm's scheme, because some are up in arms over what they see as an invasion of their privacy through Phorm's intention to categorise all of their web-surfing habits in order to target online ads at them.'
http://www.guardian.co.uk/technology/2008/mar/05/privac...phorm
More invasion of internet privacy lies ahead as outlined by this useful and easy to understand Guardian article.
If you are a customer of BT, Virgin Media and TalkTalk, based in the UK, remember BT have a lot of customers in Ireland too, all of your browsing could be profiled to develop advertising phishing ( http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Phishing ).
BT have already started trials in the UK without customers consent.
'News of the deal has leaked out ahead of the service's launch. BT says it will begin trialling soon with "a few thousand" customers, though the Guardian has learnt that BT and Phorm tested the service in secret last summer; at least one customer noticed (tinyurl.com/25jwn6) and began worrying that his machine had been infected by a Trojan. BT's support centre had not been told, but later said there was "an issue" affecting "a small number of users". BT denied any involvement with Phorm at the time. The lack of candour has now aroused the ire of many who have learnt about it, who see this as a matter of trust - and are not convinced that ISPs are earning that trust.'
Comments (4 of 4)
Jump To Comment: 1 2 3 4Retentia is a leading provider of Homeland Security, Data Retention and Tracking Software and Services. We sell our software to Telco's, Enterprises, ISPs and Law Enforcement agencies all over the world.
http://retentia.com/
Europe is the first region to mandate data retention in legislation with a clear deployment timetable and penalties for non compliance. Yet demand for data retention solutions is also growing in Latin America, Asia, and the Middle East based on the desire of governments, law enforcement, and intelligence agencies to fight crime and terrorism more effectively. The United States is also expected to be a major market for data retention solutions very soon.
http://www.intelligentias.com/company/corporate_overvie...w.htm
Records of e-mails and internet chat messages sent and received by Irish residents - and the times they log on and off the internet - will have to be stored for three years. The scheme will be implemented within a month.
http://www.ireland.com/newspaper/frontpage/2008/0119/12....html
http://www.digitalrights.ie/
This is a letter which the Department of Justice wrote in July 2006 indicating that they would consult us before drafting any measures implementing the Data Retention Directive. 18 months later we still haven’t heard anything concrete from them, despite reports that they plan to put laws in place within the next month. Equally in the dark are the ISPs and others in the internet industry who will face the technical challenges and cost of implementation:
And digital civil Rights in Europe:
http://www.edri.org/
Joel Johnston: Yesterday, I was invited to talk about gadgets onThe Hugh Thompson Show, a television-style talk show sponsored exclusively by AT&T for distribution on the online AT&T Tech Channel. I eventually did talk about gadgets, but in light of AT&T's shocking and baffling announcement of their plans to filter the internet, I thought that a much more interesting and important topic.
So that's what I talked about.
As you can see from the video, the crew ended up scrubbing the interview about half-way through. Figuring that might happen, I asked my steely-nerved friend Richard Blakeley to tape the first take.
http://gadgets.boingboing.net/2008/01/21/talking-about-....html
Great video clip.
Watch the host flinch and hold is face when AT&T his first mentioned by his guest!
Also, of interest is how the audience very much agreed with the concept of not having their emails and personal data checked by corporate elites or government. This is irrelevant, as the only voice that will air on that show will be a one filtered by AT&T, their advertisers and their ex-security-analyst host.
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