Tag: privacy

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Cyberinfrastructure Education Innovation Reading Technology

Latest Read: Tor

Tor: From the Dark Web to the Future of Privacy by Ben Collier.

Tor: From the Dark Web to the Future of Privacy by Ben Collier

Ben holds a MSc in Criminology and Criminal Justice from the University of Edinburgh and a PhD in Criminology from the Scottish Centre for Crime and Justice Research. He is a Cambridge Cybercrime Centre postdoctoral researcher and long-term collaborator with this interdisciplinary center, focusing on online hacker communities and cybercrime markets. Today he is a Senior Lecturer in Digital Methods at the University of Edinburgh within the Department of Science, Technology, and Innovation Studies (STIS).

The Dark Web is a subset of the internet that was designed to be hidden from search engines and requires specific software, like Tor. Well known for illegal marketplaces (Silk Road) for drugs, firearms, murder for hire, stolen data, selling breached data, and hacking services, yet in fact is also serving as a privacy resource. Here forums allow users to exchange data regarding whistleblower platforms and also permits journalists to communicate in countries with strict censorship.

Insert irony: the very markets trafficking in illicit goods today rely on a architecture engineered by the U.S. Naval Research Laboratory.

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Artificial Intelligence Education Reading

Latest Read: Privacy-Preserving Machine Learning

Privacy-Preserving Machine Learning by J. Morris Chang, Di Zhuang, and G. Dumindu Samaraweera.

Privacy-Preserving Machine Learning by J. Morris Chang, Di Zhuang, and G. Dumindu Samaraweera

Morris holds a BSEE from Tatung University, Taiwan and MS and PhD in computer engineering from North Carolina State University. He teaches at the University of South Florida. Di holds PhD in Computer Engineering from Iowa State University and the University of South Florida. He is a Security / Privacy Engineer at Snap Inc. Dumindu holds a MSc in Enterprise Application Development from Sheffield Hallam University and PhD in Electrical Engineering and Philosophy from University of South Florida. Today he is Assistant Professor of Data Science at Embry-Riddle Aeronautical University.

This was a book that places into perspective the need for ensuring privacy in our fast paced AI marketplace. The authors express the need not only to understand privacy within Machine Learning systems, but understanding methodologies to preserve user’s private data while maintaining performance on LLMs.

They address how personal data well embedded across various sectors increases the risks of data breaches. Just realize how your smartphone is tracked by marketing companies. In fact, they review the Facebook-Cambridge Analytica scandal and call for robust privacy measures in data-driven applications.

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Artificial Intelligence Education Reading

Latest Read: Your Face Belongs to Us

Your Face Belongs to Us: A Secretive Startup’s Quest to End Privacy as We Know It by Kashmir Hill.

Your Face Belongs to Us: A Secretive Startup’s Quest to End Privacy as We Know It by Kashmir Hill

Kashmir holds a masters degrees in journalism from New York University. Her writing has appeared in The New Yorker and The Washington Post. Kashmir is a technology reporter at The New York Times after having worked at Gizmodo Media Group, Fusion, Forbes Magazine, and Above the Law.

Perhaps of the most shocking books in fact that I have read in some time. Kashmir is documenting how a small AI company provided facial recognition to law enforcement, billionaires, and businesses. Yet, it should be no surprise this has eroded privacy as we know it.

Kashmir introduces readers to this chilling story as a skeptic. A tip regarding a mysterious app called Clearview AI held a claim it could with 99% accuracy identify anyone based upon a single photograph of their face. The app indeed provided a person’s online name, social media profiles, friends, family members, and their home address. This was just for starters and in the wrong hands, would be a very powerful surveillance tool.

Clearview AI was a start up run by Australian computer engineer Hoan Ton-That and Richard Schwartz, a former Rudy Giuliani advisor. The company was funded by conservative provocateur Charles C. Johnson and billionaire Donald Trump backer Peter Thiel. In contrast, Google and Facebook chose that this type of tool was too dangerous to release. However, via private investors, Clerview AI would be pitched to thousands of law enforcement agencies around the world.

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Education Reading

Latest Read: Profit over Privacy

Profit over Privacy: How Surveillance Advertising Conquered the Internet by Matthew Crain.

Profit over Privacy: How Surveillance Advertising Conquered the Internet by Matthew Crain

Matthew holds a PhD from the University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign. He is an assistant professor of media and communication at Miami University of Ohio and previously taught at Queens College, City University of New York.

The contemporary internet’s de facto business model is one of Surveillance has been the new black. While browser cookies follow us around the web, Web beacons can track and harvest every Google search, every webpage visited, In fact, on a growing number of global websites, beacons know where you click. Yes indeed they know everything about you and are monetizing all of your online activities every day.

In Profit over Privacy, Matthew is delivering a solid historical beginning to the billion dollar surveillance advertising business.

In fact, Facebook posted revenues over $319 billion in 2021 alone. Surprised learning this is below their 2020 revenue? The loss of our privacy is via Facebook, Google, and Amazon. They certainly resell our online activity to data brokers.

Matthew is tracing this surveillance advertising back to the Clinton administration. This includes the launch of the country’s Nation Information Infrastructure and how the long established Information Infrastructure Task Force (IITF) designed a safe approach which did acknowledge the coming online profiling of citizens. The FTC also looked to consumer empowerment. But in America, politics ran amok.

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Education Reading

Latest Read: Digital Earth

Digital Earth: Cyber Threats, Privacy and Ethics in an Age of Paranoia by Sarah Katz. She is currently a Cybersecurity Technical Writer at Microsoft.

Digital Earth: Cyber threats, privacy and ethics in an age of paranoia by Sarah Katz

Sarah holds Master of Arts, Terrorism and Counterterrorism Operations from Middlebury Institute of International Studies at Monterey and a PhD in Cyberpsychology from Capitol Technology University. Sarah has been published in Cyber Defense Magazine, Dark Reading, Infosecurity Magazine, and ISACA Journal.

On the surface this book may appear not to be for organizational leaders, it actually belongs in the hands of your organization’s CIO, Finance, Legal, Risk Management and of course CISO. However this is for your leadership. Sarah has written a well researched book addressing key cybersecurity threats. This should be review by any organization’s entire technology division. In fact, this extends well beyond any organization’s IT Division or dedicated team. You’ll see why.

This is a perfect read for anyone studying or holding an interesting in cybersecurity career fields. Sarah provides in depth research from well established cybersecurity firms, Homeland Security, and research institutions both in private and public sectors.

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