October 31, 2018 Mohit Kumar Apple introduces a new privacy feature for all new MacBooks that "at some extent" will prevent hackers and malicious applications from eavesdropping on your conversations. Apple's custom T2 security chip in the latest MacBooks includes a new hardware feature that physically disconnects the MacBook's built-in microphone whenever the user closes the lid, the company revealed yesterday at its event at the Brooklyn Academy of Music in New York. Though the new T2 chip is already present in the 2018 MacBook Pro models launched earlier this year, this new feature got unveiled when Apple launched the new Retina MacBook Air and published a full security guide for T2 Chip yesterday. "This disconnect is implemented in hardware alone, and therefore prevents any software, even with root or kernel privileges in macOS, and even the software on the T2 chip, from engaging the microphone when the lid is closed,...
Facebook fined £500,000 for Cambridge Analytica scandal
Facebook has been fined £500,000 by the UK's data protection watchdog for its role in the Cambridge Analytica data scandal.
The Information Commissioner's Office (ICO) said Facebook had let a "serious breach" of the law take place.
The fine is the maximum allowed under the old data protection rules that applied before GDPR took effect in May.
The ICO said Facebook had given app developers access to people's data "without clear consent".
In July, the ICO notified the social network that it intended to issue the maximum fine.
Confirming
the fine, it said in a statement: "Between 2007 and 2014, Facebook
processed the personal information of users unfairly by allowing
application developers access to their information without sufficiently
clear and informed consent, and allowing access even if users had not
downloaded the app, but were simply 'friends' with people who had."
"Facebook also failed to keep the personal information secure because
it failed to make suitable checks on apps and developers using its
platform."
Facebook said it was "reviewing" the ICO's decision.
"While
we respectfully disagree with some of their findings, we have said
before that we should have done more to investigate claims about
Cambridge Analytica and taken action in 2015," it said in a statement.
What was the Cambridge Analytica data scandal?
Researcher
Dr Aleksandr Kogan and his company GSR used a personality quiz to
harvest the Facebook data of up to 87 million people.
Some of this data was shared with Cambridge Analytica, which used it to target political advertising in the US.
"Even
after the misuse of the data was discovered in December 2015, Facebook
did not do enough to ensure those who continued to hold it had taken
adequate and timely remedial action, including deletion," the ICO said.
The ICO found that more than one million people in the UK had their data harvested by the personality quiz.
"A company of its size and expertise should have known better and it
should have done better," said Information Commissioner Elizabeth
Denham.
The ICO is still investigating how data analytics is used for political purposes.
Ms Denham is due to give evidence to the Department for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport (DCMS) Select Committee on 6 November.
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