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Big Brother Awards 78

Posted by CmdrTaco from the hey-there's-a-good-idea dept.
Kodi writes "According to an article on ZDNN, Privacy International is accepting nominations for its Big Brother Awards, designed to recognize the US companies that have done the most to invade our privacy. " I can think of (intel) a few companies that (intel) could conceivably (intel) be nominated. Gimme a minute to think about it.
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Big Brother Awards More

Big Brother Awards

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  • Actually, If your mad about Intel serial #'s, your a little behind, because the Apple Lisa had serial #'s built into the hardware as well.
  • Actually, I recall an old Wired article, in which, it said that Microsoft's online store was going to sell customer information to the highest bidder, I don't know if they actually did that, though.
  • Well, here's a Scientific American [sciam.com] article on some of Microsoft's plans that you guys probobly either forgot about or never heard of.
  • "PI is also bestowing awards to recognise the work of individuals who are active in the protection of privacy."

    Ron Paul [house.gov] should get that one, he's been pushing through alot of pro-privacy bills in the house, and is often the only republican who votes against anti-drug legislation as well.
  • I bet most of the SPAM I get now may be due to AhOLe sniffing out TO:/From: addresses of members corresponding with the outside ... farging bastages.
  • Junkbuster is one of the most useful Internet tool I have ever installed on my machine!

    Jon
  • All private universities should get an award. You give up all your rights when you go to one of those. Compared to the KGB, CIA, FBI, and IRS of the average private school, Intel looks like Mickey mouse.
  • Protect privacy, boycott Intel: http://www.bigbrotherinside.org



  • Is Sean McLawran [mclawran.ca] in the running?


    --
    As long as each individual is facing the TV tube alone, formal freedom poses no threat to privilege.
  • Here's a classic usenet post [dejanews.com] where Mr. Gates states his company could have the responsibility of being big brother and turn people in when they were caught doing bad things, say, pirating software!

  • Am I being paranoid, or is it odd that a privacy organization running a "Big Brother" award is asking for information such as Name, Phone Number, and email address.

    Just who is Big Brother?

    Mike
    derGott

  • Don't SPARCs have serial numbers in them?

    I think its great personally. Being able to track
    what people are doing in a corporate setting is a
    good thing. It makes administration a lot easier,
    and can save lots of dollars.
  • I nominate the entire cellular phone industry for not providing any encryption of their traffic whatsoever. Now they are pushing for legislation to ban the sale, purchase and use of any equipment that could possibly intercept their signal.

    Losers! They broadcast unencrypted voice signal across my front yard but want it to be illegal for me to detect it?

    BIG BROTHER AWARD
  • Hear-hear!

    I second this nomination!

    -k
  • remember that starcraft registry incident blizzard had a few months ago?
    that should help them up onto the charts
  • given what we know now about Microsoft...he's right and the only idiots are those who use MS stuff
  • Crow's first line was going to be mine but I got beat to it, however, as I mentioned (if my post made it in spite of the recent troubles) in the MS thread the specs for their latest outrage include a way around the lack of a NIC card that requires a random number generator and it seems (Intel) like I've recently seen (Intel) something about a CPU (Intel) that does that very thing (Intel).


    BTW In his appearance this morning on C-SPAN Katz mentioned that his next book is going to be about the rise of the geeks. I'm sure you're all as shocked and surprised as I am.

  • Furthermore, it's just a stupid idea anyways. Considering how many PCs out there are "Family PCs" or "Company PCs", which can have many possible users. You have a PSN for the machine, but you have no sure way of knowing which USER is on it at a given time.

    The other side of the coin is users who use multiple machines (ie, one at home, one at work). Now, thanks to the "added security of the P3 PSN", it's entirely concievable that you can only access a PSN-enabled site from one of those locations...and heaven help you if you sell your computer.

    So, you've bought a not-so-new P3 box...and within months, you start receiving email/snail mail from Necrophiles R Us and the Transylvanian Home Renovation Network, all because the person you bought the machine (and it's PSN) from was a sick freak and your data got mashed together in the wash.

    I'm not against the PSN because it's a violation of my privacy, I'm against it because advertising it as a Web-tool is a REALLY DUMB IDEA!!!


  • Nah. Taken it the context in which he made the remark, he's right.
  • It's already happening, around here the local schools will finger print your kid for you "in case they are ever kidnapped". Look I understand the pain of people who have had their kids taken, but to have schools finger print your kids and keep the records, or as happened a few weeks ago, haveing the local sherifs deparment call up soliciting to figerprint your kid for "thier safety and protection". It is just so frigtening.
    Yeah, lets get every body in the NCIC database as soon as they enter kindergarden or head start.

  • Man... if their so-called "bug" doesn't lead to a class-action lawsuit...

    I get steamed just thinking about it. Yeah, ok, the bug some years back about Word files including random data, that could have been a legitimate bug I GUESS. But associating a unique ID # with a user's personal info AND building a database of that information is no "bug." And the justifications I've been reading (tech support, etc) are totally bogus.

    I mean, even if they say that it was supposed to be a "checkbox" or whatever that toggled sending that info, they should have been clued in when 100% of their users were "choosing" to send their unique ID, right?

    Where's the outrage in the mainstream press?! This is scary stuff!
    W

    -------------------
  • Our "privacy" is "violated" in many ways that have nothing to do with what OS we're running or on what hardware we're running it.

    Anyone been to their ATM machine for cash lately? Notice that little surveillance camera? Been to the local convenience store? Another surveillance camera. The grocery store? Another camera. Did you pay for your groceries with a check? Probably had to show ID which included or was tied to your SSN, phone number, address, and other "personal" information. Did you use your ATM card with the Visa logo to pay for *anything* lately? What about your library card? Have you noticed surveillance cameras in the shopping mall? In some cities they're at intersections watching for cars that run red lights. In England I understand they're using surveillance cameras in heavily trafficked downtown areas. Have you used your health insurance or car insurance lately?

    And the list goes on and on. It's not just about MAC addresses and CPU IDs. We're under surveillance "for our safety" many hours of the day. At least here in the good old US of A
  • but perhaps you get my meaning?
  • Not only do they not tell you they are collecting info, they specifically say they aren't. The upgrade wizard says that they don't send any information about your system to microsoft.
  • Sorry for the spelling.....
    From what i understand, they are doing it to all convicted murderers and sex offenders. They were going to add burglers to that list because they some times end up killing people while robbing them. I do not think that is to bad. If i get killed or what not it would like to have the persons dna on file so if i cut him and he leaves blood or stuff they can find him.

    ps. Once you are in jail or the army you are owned by the goverment.


    --
    Joshua Curtis
    Lancaster Co. Linux Users Group
  • Why does it seem that once you become popular, you automatically become a target here? With Intel and Microsoft, it's one thing as they've got enough reasons to object too. However, now that RedHat and VA are getting larger, they're now on many hitlists. Linus is getting up there? Well, hell he sucks too.

    Is this just a side effect of people who don't care if they're right or wrong, as long as they're in the minority (and therefore "elite")?

    How much longer till we see a large movement away from Linux because it's too popular?
  • Yep ... in fact, most of us take it for granted that any kind of "authority" has access to information about us ... We are used to Big Brother watching over our daily lives, we don't think about it much in terms of credit card use, etc!

    On another note, I've often wondered why so many websites need so much information about me ... well, other than to sell this info to spammers!
  • I can think of (Microsoft) a few companies that (Microsoft) could conceivably (Microsoft) be nominated. Gimme a minute to think about it.

    I think the thing with includeing MAC addresses in documents without telling people is much worse.
  • It really depends on whether you were informed or had access to such information when you applied, didn't you? It's very much available information at Caltech at least, and if you don't read it is your fault, not theirs. It is a tradeoff for a world-class education vs privacy concerns. I accepted the tradeoff; I'm not sure if anyone who is good enough to get into a private school will refuse that kind of tradeoff.

    AS
    AS
  • I'm surprised you haven't gotten a lot of flak from the Dilberts of the world railing against an oppressive/authoritative upper management...

    There is a difference between making people accountable for their actions and actually scrutinizing their actions. I would assume that making people accountable be of much much higher importance than just being able to see and regulate. Self regulation, self motivation, self autmonomy seems to be more effective and efficient than having cops at every intersection preventing jay walking and running red lights.

    IANAM
    But I am not a manager, so I may be wrong on this angle.

    AS

    AS
  • RH is not going to be the distribution people hate, why is it that RH popularity pisses people off.

    If you do not like the product OK, your choice but what drives you to dislike the company. Granted it is an extremely popular distro, and seems to be every where but they have not done anything injurious to anyone. All they are trying to do is make money, and not a lot I might add.



  • Don't register your software. I don't register my software with the company which created it.
  • So Intel puts serial numbers in the processor. Your computer probably already has a unique serial number in it, in your hard disk drive. Why are people not outraged at this?

    What could possibly make a serial number accessable to the outside world?

    Software!

    Don't be outraged at the hardware vendors, be outraged at the browser makers, operating system makers and other software makers who read your serial number(s) and send them out to the world without your knowledge.

    Personally, I'm in favor of serializing CPUs. For the same reason I'm glad my automobile, VCR, etc. have serial numbers. As a record of ownership, and to help track down thieves.



  • The United States Department of Defense probably deserves the award for collecting DNA signatures from all active duty service members. What could possibly be more personal? From my understanding, federal law enforcement agencies have access to these DNA signatures and can use them in their investigations. Furthermore, I don't think that service members can have their DNA records expunged when they exit the military.

    It doesn't seem like it would be that much of a stretch for public schools and hospitals to start doing the same thing.
  • are slime, too. I don't think Microsoft has sold the data to others.
  • I certainly think that this whole ID thing built into the new P III's is not the greatest idea, after all, what kind of real applications will be implemented anytime really soon. However, I don't really see why people are getting so bent out of shape about it. I could really care less. The only way that anyone could really do anything with the ID is if you (the buyer) are FORCED to register it. As many of you probably know, just because they try to force you to register doesn't mean that it has to be registered legally, or sometimes at all. The other thing is, what could someone really do with this ID number? Wow, they may be able to tell when you are connected to the internet, but what real advantage would somone get from that? I don't think this is such a problem. If you don't want to have the stupid ID on your chip, then get a different chip that does not have it. Anyhow, my point is that this has gotten WAY too much attention from the nation. I am done ranting now...
  • Or have they stopped collecting the information on what you're looking for when you search altavista?

    Seems to me that when an advertiser gets the list of search words you're wanting, and pops a cookie on your system (you *DO* reject cookies from other than the site you're connected to, right?) for later recall (you *DO* edit you cookie lists, don't you?), they're going too far.

    (Update - I just popped over to altavista, and it looks like they're not doing ads with doubleclick any longer - at least this time. But I'll still nominate them for historical reasons.)

    Or maybe I'm just paranoid.
  • Put your monitor in a Faraday cage or some other grounded metal enclosure if you're really worried about this.

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