Brief Facebook glitch sent private messages to wrong users: Via Law & Disorder Section - Ars Technica.

Last night, a number of Facebook users began getting hundreds of private messages and friend requests intended for other users, according to a Wall Street Journal report. While the problem was only temporary, it adds to the growing concern that Facebook doesn't do enough to ensure the privacy of its users' data. [ Read more ... ]

Any use of this article without the NFL's express written consent is prohibited: Via Law & Disorder Section - Ars Technica.

With the Super Bowl just concluded and baseball's spring training only weeks away, a question occurred to us: whatever happened to the push for copyright holders to tone down their copyright notices?

We hear and see the warnings whenever a football or baseball game is televised, whenever we read books, whenever we watch a movie. These are the sort of warnings that make claims like, "Any other use of this telecast or any pictures, descriptions, or accounts of the game without the NFL's consent is prohibited," despite the apparent wrongheadedness of the statement. [ Read more ... ]

Cisco's wiretapping system open to exploit, says researcher: Via Law & Disorder Section - Ars Technica.

To meet the needs of law enforcement, most telecommunications equipment includes hardware and software that allow for the monitoring of traffic originating with the targets of investigations. The precise capabilities are often dictated by formalized standards, which allow any hardware maker to implement a compliant system. Unfortunately, these standards often leave the hardware wide open to various attacks that leave regular users vulnerable, and provide savvy surveillance targets the opportunity to evade the snooping. An IBM researcher has put Cisco's system under the microscope at a Black Hat Conference, and found it comes up short. [ Read more ... ]

WikiLeaks, struggling to make ends meet, begs for donations: Via Law & Disorder Section - Ars Technica.

WikiLeaks—a wiki that made a name for itself by publishing anonymous, classified information—has been temporarily shut down due to its own budget crisis. The Sunshine Press, the nonprofit organization behind WikiLeaks, has decided to cease operations in order to "concentrate on raising the funds necessary" to keep the site going, and is begging for donations lest it be stuck offline forever. [ Read more ... ]

Will your big-screen Super Bowl party violate copyright law?: Via Law & Disorder Section - Ars Technica.

An offhand comment the other day by a friend caught my attention—"Did you know that you can't watch the Super Bowl on a TV screen larger than 55 inches? Yeah, it's right there in the law."

With the Colts and Saints set to do battle in Super Bowl XLIV, this seemed worth looking into as a public service. Could it be that some of those giant flat panel TV sets now finding their way into US living rooms are actually violating copyright law?

Read Original Article:(Via Law & Disorder Section - Ars Technica.)

Even without cookies, a browser leaves a trail of crumbs: Via Law & Disorder Section - Ars Technica.

Those with no technical knowledge generally believe that they are anonymous when simply browsing the Web. Those who know more might recognize that IP addresses can be used to do some rough targeting, while browser cookies can be used to track someone across sessions and across IP addresses. But what if your browser itself—even with cookies off and IP addresses out of the picture—was leaving a digital fingerprint at every site you visit?

That possibility lies behind a new experiment from the Electronic Frontier Foundation, something called "Panopticlick." (Insert your favorite Bentham/Foucault joke here.)

Read Original Article:(Via Law & Disorder Section - Ars Technica.)

Netflix to FCC: scary loophole in net neutrality rules: Via Law & Disorder Section - Ars Technica.

Netflix, the company that mails out DVDs and streams movies to millions of home theater potatoes, made the rounds to the Federal Communications Commission on Friday. The company's general counsel told staffers and Commissioners that the movie rental distributor supports the agency's proposed Internet nondiscrimination rules. But they also include a potentially nasty loophole, Netflix warned—the "managed services" category that the Commission created in its Notice of Proposed Rulemaking back in October.

Read Original Article:(Via Law & Disorder Section - Ars Technica.)

EU has doubts as ISP rolls out DPI for copyright enforcement: Via Law & Disorder Section - Ars Technica.

Back in November, UK ISP Virgin Media announced that it would start using deep packet inspection gear to start riffling through user traffic. The goal was to search some of the leading P2P networks in order to measure copyrighted material passing through them. Today, the European Commission indicated that the plan is problematic, and it will keep a close eye on the trial. [ Read more ... ]

Comcast wants "clear rules," even if it means net neutrality: Via Law & Disorder Section - Ars Technica.

Comcast wants "clear rules" from the FCC when it comes to network management, and it wants them so badly that it's even willing to accept network neutrality as the price of getting them. What the huge ISP does not want is the kind of ambiguity that led to so much acrimony about its P2P blocking in 2008, and which is now being hashed out in a DC courtroom.

Read Original Article:(Via Law & Disorder Section - Ars Technica.)

Warning, Nexus One users! Dangerous fees may lie ahead: Via Law & Disorder Section - Ars Technica.

Tempted by Google's new Nexus One phone but having second thoughts? If you're going to break your two-year contract on the subsidized model, make sure you do it in one of two ways: within 14 days of acquiring the phone or after four months of phone usage. Canceling at any point between 14 days and 120 days subjects you to a set of terrific fees, payable both to Google and T-Mobile.

And these go far beyond just paying back the device subsidy.

Read Original Article:(Via Law & Disorder Section - Ars Technica.) [ Read more ... ]

Verizon: metered billing much fairer than all-you-can-eat: Via Law & Disorder Section - Ars Technica.

Verizon Wireless' top engineer, Dick Lynch, was at it again during CES, setting the stage for a world in which Verizon moves away from flat-rate pricing and adopts metered billing instead. Lynch, a staple on the conference circuit, has made such comments for some time, and they regularly draw a negative reaction from consumers. But to Lynch, it's a matter of fairness—and a response to a newly "open" wireless world.

First, when it comes to traditional data usage from 3G smartphones and laptop cards, Lynch argues that buffet economics produce unfair subsidies to the heaviest users. [ Read more ... ]

Skeptical judges ask FCC if Comcast P2P smackdown was legal: Via Law & Disorder Section - Ars Technica.

Comcast has had its day in court over the issue of "network management." News accounts suggest that the three-judge panel from the DC Court of Appeals was plenty skeptical that the FCC had the proper authority to sanction Comcast's BitTorrent blocking in 2008. [ Read more ... ]

Canada says "no" to Yes Men website: Via Law & Disorder Section - Ars Technica.

When corporate pranksters The Yes Men staged a December stunt against the Canadian government's emission proposals, the group had no idea that the resulting backlash would take down more than 4,000 unrelated websites. Whatever you think of the hoax, the saga is a reminder of the power of ISPs and Web hosting companies. If they don't like what you're saying and doing, there are often no consequences to shutting down or blocking sites, even when tremendous collateral damage ensues. [ Read more ... ]

FTC reminds us that storing data in the cloud has drawbacks: Via Law & Disorder Section - Ars Technica.

Take Google's new Nexus One phone as a case study of the pros and cons of storing life details on remote servers. Nexus One phones can back up their complete settings to Google's servers, including data such as "Wi-Fi passwords, bookmarks, a list of the applications you've installed, the words you've added to the dictionary used by the onscreen keyboard, and most of the settings that you configure with the Settings application." Get a new phone and the data transfers easily. [ Read more ... ]

Big wireless to FCC: be consistent—except when it benefits us: Via Law & Disorder Section - Ars Technica.

Lobbying is a fast and furious game, one where the lobbyists must make every attempt to present things that benefit their industry as if they are a triumph of dispassionate reason—even when their positions seem to contradict one another.

The wireless phone industry filed a document (PDF) Tuesday with the FCC that led us to ponder the mysteries of the lobbyists, [ Read more ... ]

SOC's slippery slope: good enough for movies, why not sports?: Via Law & Disorder Section - Ars Technica.

Back when we had our debate with cable's top lobbyist Kyle McSlarrow over whether to let Hollywood block analog streams to your home theater setup, I asked a worried question. If the Federal Communications Commission does give movie studios and cable companies the green light to implement Selectable Output Control (SOC) on "premium" early run movies, who else might petition for it next? [ Read more ... ]

Comcast settles P2P throttling class-action for $16 million: Via Law & Disorder Section - Ars Technica.

Comcast has agreed to settle a class-action lawsuit over the throttling of P2P connections that had users up in arms in late 2007 and 2008. The company still stands behind its controversial methods for "managing" network traffic, but claims that it wants to "avoid a potentially lengthy and distracting legal dispute that would serve no useful purpose." [ Read more ... ]

Satellite TV to FCC: we're special, don't make us open up: Via Law & Disorder Section - Ars Technica.

If you've tried to pump your fully-paid-up cable connection into, say, a computer running Windows Media Center, you've probably come up against the closed nature of pay-TV and the severe limitations of CableCARD. And what about satellite TV? Don't even think about it.

The FCC wants to blow open the market for third-party video devices, scrapping some of the current (failed) CableCARD rules and adding satellite providers to the list. [ Read more ... ]

FTC complaint says Facebook's privacy changes are deceptive: Via Law & Disorder Section - Ars Technica.

Facebook claimed it was doing the world a favor when it updated how the site handles privacy settings earlier this month, but the change has done nothing but get the company in even more hot water. Amid heavy criticism from rights and privacy groups, the Electronic Privacy Information Center (EPIC) has called on the Federal Trade Commission to investigate the changes that it says mislead users and "contradict Facebook’s own representations." [ Read more ... ]

Is Netflix "borking" lesbians with subscriber data releases?: Via Law & Disorder Section - Ars Technica.

It was really just a matter of time before Netflix was the target of a class-action lawsuit over its privacy policies; academics have pointed out for years how the company's release of "anonymized" movie rental data could actually be used to expose a particular user's viewing choices. And yesterday's Netflix lawsuit by "a lesbian who does not want her sexuality nor interests in gay and lesbian themed films broadcast to the world" covers all the usual bases. [ Read more ... ]

Feature: What is DRM doing in my garage?: Via Law & Disorder Section - Ars Technica.

I never expected to stumble upon a Digital Millennium Copyright Act (DMCA) story while standing beneath an unshielded light bulb in my garage, but that was before I picked up the manual for my garage door opener.

I recently moved houses, and during a Saturday largely spent clearing a terrific mass from my new garage, I came across a tattered copy of the owner's manual for the garage door opener, thoughtfully left behind for my use. I read through the manual looking for information on how to acquire another remote control unit, when my eye was caught by the sort of statement one does not expect to find in any sort of literature relating to the humble garage door.

Read Original Article:(Via Law & Disorder Section - Ars Technica.)

Vimeo sued; have staffers uploaded infringing content?: Via Law & Disorder Section - Ars Technica.

Who would want to sue Vimeo? The video-sharing site was never meant to be a hub for illicit Simpsons clips and films broken into 10-minute increments; it was supposed to be about original content and community. "From the beginning, Vimeo was created by filmmakers and video creators who wanted to share their creative work, along with intimate personal moments of their everyday life," is how the site describes itself.

Since its founding in 2004, Vimeo has largely avoided the content-related problems (and lawsuits) that have dogged similar services like Veoh and YouTube. But, according to major music label EMI, Vimeo has a double standard [ Read more ... ]

Predator drones use less encryption than your TV, DVDs: Via Law & Disorder Section - Ars Technica.

What three-letter Internet acronym best fits the bizarre news out of Iraq and Afghanistan that militants there have been intercepting US Predator drone video feeds using laptops and a $30 piece of Russian software: LOL, WTF, or OMG? [ Read more ... ]

New Internet Bill of Rights contender comes from... pirates?: Via Law & Disorder Section - Ars Technica.

Pirates aren't generally known for taking inspiration from America's Founding Fathers, but the lone Pirate Party member in the European Parliament is calling for an Internet "Bill of Rights."

Two weeks ago, MEP Christian Engström announced that he was partnering with the Greens to work on an Internet Bill of Rights that would one day be submitted to the European Parliament—and he wanted the collective wisdom of the "swarm" to help him draft such a document. Engström's own key principles were three: a set of fundamental rights (privacy, etc), network neutrality, and "mere conduit" protection for ISPs.

Read Original Article:(Via Law & Disorder Section - Ars Technica.)

"So, Verizon, about those doubled early termination fees...": Via Law & Disorder Section - Ars Technica.

The FCC has been asking plenty of "innocent questions" lately about the mobile space. It doesn't threaten any direct action against companies like AT&T and Apple, it just wants "a more complete understanding" of some situations. But those questions usually get results. [ Read more ... ]