A British woman was shocked to find out that live images of her bedroom were viewable on a travel news site.

A security camera used for traffic monitoring was pointed at her bedroom and recording.

Filmed images on the site were so detailed that the pillows on her bed were easily identifiable.

The woman described the situation as an inexcusable invasion of her family’s privacy.

She is accusing workers at Transport for London of deliberately pointing the camera at her bedroom.

The camera’s pictures were discovered by a commuter who uses the traffic website to monitor traffic levels.

He was shocked to find the camera was filming a bedroom instead of the street traffic.

The camera position has been fixed and British government authorities claim to be investigating the matter.

[ Source: The Sun UK ]

The Telegraph is reporting that the UK will require all internet service providers and telecommunications companies to save and store all personal communications made by users for one year.

In addition, this stored personal information will be made available for use by 653 government departments and agencies including law enforcement, fire and other emergency services, the Financial Services Authority, prison personnel and local governments.

Shockingly, retrieving this personal information will not even require legal permission from a judge – permission from a department head is all that will be required.

The newly proposed legislation will drastically increase the amount of personal information that can be easily obtained by government employees and bureaucrats.

Under the proposed legislation all telephone calls, text messages, emails as well as web searches and other online activities by citizens will be saved for a year and will be made available for use by government bodies.

UK home secretary Chris Grayling warned that the new legislation has the potential for “mission creep,” where new powers enacted for one purpose “end up being used for completely different purposes.”

Ministers had originally planned to save all of this personal data on a centralized government-owned database, but decided against it due to not to privacy concerns.

Instead, privately controlled “Big Brother” databases will be mandated to store the information. Critics of the plan refer to it as “state-spying” and “covert surveillance” on the private citizens.

Most communications companies already save details of every user’s calls and emails for their own business reasons. However, most only do this for a few months.

The new proposal, which goes by the Orwellian name of “Intercept Modernisation Programme”, will require these companies to save their customer records for longer as well as broaden the types of information they save to include every online click.

Source: Telegraph.co.uk

A new generation of “smart” billboards will watch people and record information about them as they view the advertisements displayed on them.

The new hi-tech billboards will have small video cameras that record personal and demographic information about passersby like gender, estimated age and time spent looking at the billboard. This recorded information will then be sent to a central database where it can be stored and analyzed by marketers.

The companies behind this new technology claim that privacy should not be an issue since they are not storing actual images of people.

The digital cameras will use software that can detect when a person is standing in front of a billboard. The software can then analyze facial features to determine a person’s gender and estimated age. The software will eventually be used to determine the person’s race as well.

The goal of this new form of advertising is to tailor a digital display to the person standing in front of it. One advertisement can be shown to a teenage white girl, for example, and a different one to a teenage black male.

While surveillance cameras are commonplace in many public places and businesses, their use may be viewed as more intrusive when they are used to sell products rather than fight crime and terrorism.

The new technology is already being used in Europe and parts of Asia, but it is new in the United States.

The companies that make these digital advertising systems say that with a little modification, they could easily store pictures of people who look at the billboards.

One of these companies is TruMedia, whose technology is an offshoot of surveillance work for the Israeli government. TruMedia’s slogan is “Every Face Counts,” and they are testing the digital technology cameras in 30 locations in the US.

Privacy issues over public surveillance cameras are growing. In the United Kingdom, which has approximately 4.2 million surveillance cameras ( one for every 14 people ) the matter is fast becoming a heated political issue.

Source: New York Times

Cell phones and digital cameras, along with a sense of public duty, are propelling a new form of citizen “snitching” that some are calling “cyber snitching.”

This troubles some privacy experts, who are concerned that a sense of civic duty could quickly degenerate into a loss of personal privacy.

One example cited involves bystanders, who willingly turned over their cellphone videos and digital photos to help Montreal police identify and arrest hockey rioters last week. It was the most recent example of public citizens helping the police do their work.

Anie Lemieux, spokeswoman for Montreal police, observed: “We often say the public’s eyes are police eyes.”

However, Richard Rosenberg, professor emeritus of computer science at the University of British Columbia, said there is a slippery slope between justified and invasive involvement.

The incident in Montreal struck Rosenberg as an example of turning the general population into a branch of the police, where neighbours and people you don’t even know are snooping and spying on one another to see if there’s something the police might be interested in.

Mr. Rosenberg is also the president of the British Columbia Freedom of Information and Privacy Association.

Source: Canada.com

Wired.com’s How-To Wiki has published the following tips for helping consumers fight identity theft:

1. You can opt out of pre-screened credit card mailings by calling 888-5OPTOUT ( 888-567-8688 ). This stops identity thieves from stealing your mail and getting credit lines in your name.

2. You should check your credit reports regularly. US federal law allows you to request a free credit report from each of the three credit bureau providers once a year.

3. Active duty military personnel can automatically put a one-year alert on all three of their credit reports by contacting one of them: Equifax – 800-525-6285; Experian – 888-397-3742; TransUnion – 800-680-7289.

4. Study your credit, debit and banking statements each month. If you fail to report fraudulent activity on your cards or checking accounts within 60 days, your liability is not capped.

5. People who are really concerned about identity theft can place a renewable 90-day fraud alert on their credit reports for free by phone, however, this service is intended to be for people who suspect they are the victims of identity theft. Credit issuers then have to take steps to verify your identification.

6. Victims of identity theft should file a police report and send a letter requesting a seven-year fraud alert on their reports. This alert requires creditors to contact you before issuing a line of credit.

7. As of November 2007, all 50 states allow individuals to place credit freezes on their credit reports. This stops card issuers from looking at your credit report until you allow the credit bureaus to unlock it. In many states the unlocking can take anywhere from three to five days. Some states like New Jersey and Utah are working to make the unlocking process faster.

More information on fighting identity theft is available at FTC.gov.

Source: Wired.com