They cannot switch off the recording and monitoring equipment. However, there is nothing stopping them from tampering with the equipment to cause the monitoring to fail (which I would hope is a firing offense.. but probably not)

I'm sorry, $5 a month (the Progressive Snapshot thing) discount on what is typically a $100+ monthly payment is not worth them tracking my driving habits.

And yes, I read the article, and I know it says the exact opposite about population density, I disagree with it.

Sure it does, right to privacy, right to vote, right to not self incriminate. Whether through the original, or amendments to the Constitution, those are all rights.

While politics and profit, lack of competition all are major factors in our crappy broadband options, we have to keep in mind that the US is vastly greater, and far more spread out then many countries we are being compared against. The cost to wire up rural areas, hell even some of teh suburbs of major metro areas is significantly more that it is to wire up more densely populated areas. These are businesses after all, they are out to make a profit, and honestly, I do not have an issue with that. What I do have an issue with is companies lobbying for anti competitive laws that prevent local governments from doing what the for profit companies won't do. Trying to wring every last cent out of us. They make billions, yet refuse to upgrade because that will eat into their profits, and the lack of competition between what is essentially a duopoly. And while there is no concrete proof (ie written documentation), it appears that collusion between those duopolies is the name of the game, prices never come down, only go up. Then there are the un fees, below the line fees made to look like regulatory and gov fees, but really are just a way of jacking up the price, without actually having to hike the base price. Almost 30% of my bill is just fees. I could go on, but you can go peruse dslreports/broadbandreports if you really want to know more.

Yes, contractors do maintain sensitive data, but it is usually (I say usually because some people get lazy, and then dinged by audits, quite often) stored in a SCIF, or a secured section of the datacenter that is secured in the same way as a SCIF.

Actually, anyone traveling legally in the US is protected by the US Constitution. Note I said protected, not afforded all the rights, like right to vote. So yes, a foreign person traveling on US soil is still protected by the 4th Amendment. The US gets around this by declaring a person an enemy combatant, and then all protections go out the window.

Actually, this is not true. In some cases, the laws apply to you wherever you go. While it may not necessarily be applied to computer crimes, it most certainly does to crimes involving children (yes I know, think of the children). Example: American man goes to place where sex with children is legal (personally, those places need to be nuked from orbit), man returns to the US, the authorities had been notified of such through whatever mechanism, man is arrested upon landing (might have to clear customs first, not sure on that point). Granted, this is only 1 aspect in a sea of them, but the fact remains, US law was enforced on someone who did something legal in another country.

Yes, it really is a question. Simply due to the fact that there are laws and rules in place to prevent law enforcement, or even opposing defendants from obtaining that information to use against you, similar to the 5th Amendment. I guess a better way to ask the question would be will the insurance companies follow those same rules as it relates to the same data, or is there fine print buried in your contract that says they can do with it as they please.

I somewhat agree with you here. There are a few caveats though. Will the insurance company furnish the data to law enforcement on request or court order. Black box data in cars is typically at the vehicle owners discretion to be provided in any criminal or civil case, or insurance claim. The vehicles owner has the right to decline access to that data regardless of the circumstances (although that will make you more of a suspect in some cases). Now you are streaming that data to a third party, who can probably be forced to hand it over via court orders and what not. Also, the discount is worthless, I'm sorry, but $5 off a month when my insurance is close to $150 a month is not worth the hassle.

All helmets follow the exact same safety testing, and must comply with those tests to be sold. The only difference between a $400 helmet, and a $4000 one, is teh comfort level, name brand recognition, and amenities (built in communications, bluetooth etc) So yes, a cheap helmet will protect your cheap head just as much as the expensive helmet will. And considering helmets are 1 time impact, cheap comfy helmets are the best bet. example, knock it off the table and it hits the ground.. time for a new helmet.

I find that it does not matter what the hotel costs, or how fancy it is.. the internet sucks. I tend to tether to my phone and use LTE as the hotel internet is worthless for anything other than check email.. Certainly not Netflix streaming.

I disagree. The border is just one aspect, and your typical threats tend to be the result of intentional stupidity (employee systems), or internal maliciousness (soon to be ex employee). A border firewall will not help in this particular case. Additionally, depending on the users access, no firewall may help. My preference, is typically to setup every server with a default deny, permit IPSEC traffic only to and from the support components on the internal network. Then obviously open the business requirements to provide a server. Example, a Web server that connects to a DB and image processing server, port 80/443 open from external to DMZ web server (DMZ and Application zones are separate), all other incoming ports from external are blocked, your border router can cover this. Internally, default deny to everything, permit IPSEC, between Web Server, DB and Image processing server, as well as terminal/jump servers. Tunnel all communications over IPSEC between the servers. In that way, man in the middle attacks become almost impossible, there is no sniffing traffic if a user manages to get local segment access, If the system is compromised in some way (SQL injection, etc, assuming the services are not running as administrator), the servers cannot be used as a jump point to other servers and components in the network, and vice versa.... Call me paranoid.. but that is how I do things. Also, there is no additional cost (except system overhead, and that can be compensated for by crypto cards, or the new Intel AES CPU instruction sets on their current gen Xeons, and I am sure other procs) to running IPSec, it has been included on every Windows server since 2003, and for Unix, Raccoon is free and works just fine.

We could not get file sharers drawn and quartered, so we are going to spin the decision that we fought kicking and screaming to our advantage and make us look better than we really are.

How about to make their fucking customers happy. I pay Verizon (because my only other choice is Comcast, and I hate them more). I request a service, I expect my provider to give me access to this service. Netflix pays L3, L3 is their service provider. Service providers peer, that is the way the internet has always worked.