News & Commentary

With the holiday season underway, travelers are bracing themselves for the countless hassles that come with modern travel. Most have adapted to waiting on long security lines, taking off their shoes and parting with their bottled water. But international travelers often don't realize that they might also have to endure border officials viewing their Web histories. And their financial records. And their vacation photos.

Responding to public outcry over Wednesday's new privacy settings, Facebook backtracked today, announcing that it would allow users to hide their list of friends from both visitors to their profile and search results. However, you've still lost the ability to control this information: you can't select specific groups who can see your friends lists (it's either displayed or it isn't) and you can't prevent applications from accessing it no matter what.

In a move to create stricter privacy guidelines, the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) released the latest version of its grant application today that includes new requirements for video surveillance. It will now be recommended that applicants for DHS grant money perform privacy assessments if grant money is to be used to purchase, install or support cameras. The American Civil Liberties Union praised the new requirement as the first step in pushing back on the proliferation of unchecked video surveillance.

The next time you log onto Facebook, you'll be thinking about privacy: how private are your photos, friends, status updates, and personal details, and how public do you actually want them to be?

A Federal Judge ruled on Nov. 30 that a lawsuit brought by two Bay Area community organizations against federal agents over the seizure of their computers can continue.

California policymakers are deciding now whether your sensitive health-care records can be electronically shared.

On Wednesday, November 18 the Tiburon, California Town Council approved a license-plate camera surveillance system that will keep track of every vehicle that enters and leaves the city. These cameras are expensive: The system carries an initial price tag of between $137,000 and $196,000, with an additional $15,000 yearly maintenance fee.

Your life, your data. Or is it?

On Saturday, we wrote that the amended Google Book Settlement fails to answer the core privacy problems raised by the ACLU, the EFF and the Samuelson Clinic.