• (a) the value and fragility of personal data-privacy and
• (b) its relevance to freedom/liberty.

People browsing using Chrome were quietly logged into their Google accounts without their consents | So much for users’ Privacy
 Felix Omondi  September 24, 2018  Apps and Software

A professor at Johns Hopkins and a cryptography expert, Matthew Green, called out Google for making changes to Chrome, making the browser log in users into their Google account without the consent or even notifying them. A move security experts say puts the users’ privacy into jeopardy.

Historically, Chrome users have had the option of using the browser without logging in to their Google accounts. Although logging in does come with some obvious benefits such as having your bookmarks, passwords, and browsing history synced in the cloud and available across any device you are browsing on using the Chrome browser.

However, for security-conscious users who do not have Google – the most prominent advertising entity in the world – have their browsing data for purposes of sending them targeted Ads. Now that Google has made changes to the new Chrome to make the browser log users secretly into their Google Accounts means Google will get the data of users who would otherwise not have logged into their accounts.

Google has come out addressing these concerns raised by security experts stressing that users must have consented to the sync feature thus allowing the browser to transfer their data. Buried in the sync feature, is the revelation that for the sync feature as it works out will automatically also log you into your Google account.

So when a user logs in to their Gmail account on the browser, Chrome also automatically logs into their Google account. All that happens without the consent of the user or the user getting notifications.

“Now that I’m forced to log into Chrome,” wrote Green, “I’m faced with a brand new (sync consent) menu I’ve never seen before.”

Copied from: People browsing using Chrome were quietly logged into their Google accounts without their consents | So much for users’ Privacy | Innov8tiv - <http://innov8tiv.com/people-browsing-using-chrome-were-quietly-logged-into-their-google-accounts-without-their-consents-so-much-for-users-privacy/>

From here: Powershell version ...

-4wd (September 24, 2018, 06:50 AM)

The Shadow Education Secretary wants to make teachers more vulnerable
tags: Civil liberty & Regulation, Education & Academia, Internet, Privacy & Panopticon, UK affairs
Natalie Solent (Essex) - September 23rd, 2018

The Shadow Education Secretary, Angela Rayner MP (Lab), has called for a ban on anonymous online accounts.

The education spokesperson also called for social media companies to ban anonymous accounts, complaining at a fringe event organised by the Guardian in Liverpool that most of the people that abused her online did so without using their real names.

Rayner said that social media firms should take greater responsibility for their users and complained in particular that Facebook seemed to have indicated that politicians should accept a higher level of abuse.

When asked what she thought about social media, Rayner said: “One of the first things they should do is stop anonymous accounts. Most people who send me abuse me do so from anonymous accounts and wouldn’t dream of doing it in their own name.”

Rayner conceded that using real names would not stop abuse but “it would certainly help a little bit. I think they should do more, they do have a responsibility for online”.
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As I mentioned earlier, Angela Rayner is the Shadow Education Secretary. That ought to mean that she is aware that teachers, like MPs, are often subject to harassment. The Times Educational Supplement had an article on that very subject just a few days ago: “Why your social account is not as private as you think”. It began:

The teacher’s Facebook account was set to private. She was certain of that. Yet, in the past week, she had received four friend requests from former pupils. She could not work out how they had found her.

So, as I am a researcher at the Greater Manchester Police – and her friend – she asked me to take a look. Within 10 minutes, I had not just found her, but I also had her full name, her partner’s name, the school she worked at, the name of one of her children and multiple images of the street she lives on.
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The writer, Chris Glover, proceeded to give ten tips that teachers should employ to protect themselves:

• 1. Keep accounts separate.
• 2. Vary usernames.
• 3. Check posts about you.
• 4. Beware of public posts.
• 5. Review privacy settings.\
• 6. Don’t follow your school account.
• 7. Avoid using your real name.
• 8. Change the friends-list setting.
• 9. Switch off location.
• 10. Delete dormant accounts.

Following the above advice should help ensure that teachers can enjoy participating in life online while minimising the very real risk of being tracked down by former or current pupils bearing a grudge, or simply by people whom it is best to keep at arms length for professional or safeguarding reasons.

Until a Labour government gets in and makes Nos. (2) and (7) illegal outright, and demands that all of your personal details are held in one place by a social media company so as to be conveniently available for hackers and identity thieves.

• 1. Rayner - who is in the important role of Shadow Education Secretary  - would need to know about current issues in Education and would be expected to have her fingers on the Education pulse, as it were, yet she was apparently recommending a ban on anonymous online accounts, and she would have presumably been stating that as a Labour policy approach.
  
  
• 2. However, despite being Shadow Education Secretary, Rayner seemed to have been unaware of the article in The Times Educational Supplement on this rather important matter, published a few days prior. This looks to be a classic clueless and foot-in-mouth response by the Shadow Education Secretary and it could have adverse consequences - e.g., tend to make floating voters (and possibly others) think twice before voting Labour in the next general election.