Sunday, June 11, 2017

Police State: 40% of homes have appliances that can Spy on us

BIG Brother is watching. Your front door, television and child’s doll could all be spying on you. The internet of things, everyday objects connected to the web, can send and receive data and appliances have the power to gain control and track your behaviour and movements. At least 40 per cent of Australian homes now have at least one internet of things device and they are disguised as normal appliances. They can be fridges, kettles or even window blinds.

There are warnings about the danger of having an internet of things device in your home. Just last year a Norwegian Consumer Council discovered a children’s doll was recording what children were saying and sending the information to a US company, which could share and use the data in a number of different ways. The consumer council found internet-connected toys My Friend Cayla and i-Que breached several consumer laws. READ MORE

Germany to test face recognition software to target terrorist suspects

Germany will start testing facial recognition software at a Berlin train station this summer to help police track down and identify terrorist suspects, criminal offenders, and other security threats. The software will initially be tested with volunteers at Berlin’s Suedkreuz Station. If the new system proves effective, its use will not be limited to railway stations, Interior Minister Thomas de Maiziere said. “We already have video surveillance in train stations,” Maiziere said on
Saturday in an interview with German Tagesspiegel newspaper. “We are not able, however, to put a picture of a terrorist on the run into software that would alert us when he appears somewhere at a station,” de Maiziere said. “If this software proves to be reliable, it should also be used for serious crimes in other public places equipped with surveillance cameras.” READ MORE