This Beautiful Wooden Horse | The Cat Herder, Volume 1, Issue 12

Welcome to Issue 12! It's mostly about Facebook. We wish it wasn't but what can you do ... If you kn   October 21 · Issue #12 · View online Welcome to Issue 12! It’s mostly about Facebook. We wish it wasn’t but what can you do … If you know someone who might enjoy this newsletter do please send it on to them. 😼 So Facebook didn’t have a great week. The New York Times reported that [m]embers of the Myanmar military were the prime operatives behind a systematic campaign on Facebook that stretched back half a decade and that targeted the country’s mostly Muslim Rohingya minority group Kashmir Hill @kashhill Still amazes me that a college kid created a site for harvard kids to more easily hook up and now it’s used to make genocide easier https://t.co/AwgfxDFNG3 5:57 PM - 15 Oct 2018 A lawsuit was launched over fibs that were apparently told by Facebook about how many people watched videos and for how long, which ultimately led to many journalism jobs being lost, though the media companies are equally to blame for believing anything Facebook says, having been burned repeatedly by Zuckhole and his minions. ‘Was The Media’s Big “Pivot To Video” All Based On A Lie?’, Vanity Fair ‘Facebook, Corporate Bad Actor’, Talking Points Memo In a carefully orchestrated effort to grab themselves a bit of positive coverage a group of journalists was invited to come and view Facebook’s grandiosely-titled War Room which houses the teams tasked with keeping elections safe while the rest of us sleep. These stories were duly written up. As is often the case, the stories were embargoed until a particular time on a particular day. Unfortunately for Facebook a detailed story showing that Facebook-owned WhatsApp had been comprehensively gamed during the Brazilian presidential election broke on the same day. For any reasonably normal publicly traded company a story reporting that shareholders were seeking to remove the chairman wouldn’t be the third or fourth most newsworthy item in any given news week but that’s what’s happened here. Yes they did. In what we thought was a piece of peculiar timing Facebook announced their in-home surveillance kit a while back, shortly after revealing a large data breach. This device wasn’t collecting personal data, Facebook said. This device espoused the principles of privacy by design, Facebook said. You were in control, Facebook said. It turns out that was a fib too.  M.G. Siegler @mgsiegler Thank you for this beautiful, wooden horse, Facebook! We shall display it prominently in our home! https://t.co/EPJJuF2jzF 8:08 PM - 16 Oct 2018 Kevin Roose @kevinroose Correction: those big holes in the ground were not purely decorative, the oil company does, in fact, plan to collect and sell oil https://t.co/oR0jdTox3s 7:37 PM - 16 Oct 2018 Internet of Shit @internetofshit This creepy Facebook camera ISN'T EVEN OUT YET and people are already having to issue corrections that it can, indeed, track the things you do/say for ads https://t.co/vaOFsOw23L 10:41 PM - 16 Oct 2018 Seriously folks, don’t give Facebook (or Google or Amazon) your money for an always-on surveillance device which sits in your home. Even if they offer to pay you don’t put one of these things in your home.  Yes it (hopefully) will The European Data Protection Board is very keen that sanctions and other enforcement actions are applied consistently across member states. If so, a lot of the dubious CCTV schemes around Ireland (Limerick, we’re looking at you in particular) could find themselves facing tidy amounts in fines, considering this figure of €4,800 is for a single camera.  First GDPR fine issued by Austrian data protection regulator digital.freshfields.com – Share It has taken the Austrian regulator no more than 4 months to issue their first fine for a GDPR violation. This decision by the regulator,… Watch this space. One of the State’s largest hospitals appears to have taken off down their own path in implementing electronic health records, a programme which launched in the same week as the Minister for Health announced a significant investment by the European Investment Bank in a nationwide electronic health records programme. Setting aside our usual focus on the privacy and data protection issues, of which there will doubtless be many, what odds would we get on these two systems having some integration problems in the future? St James’s Hospital goes digital with electronic patient record www.irishtimes.com – Share Hospital says system will be more efficient for patients and help reduce waiting times Credit where credit is due, this is an excellent initiative from the Data Protection Commission. Irish DPC pilots data privacy lessons in Irish schools www.siliconrepublic.com – Share The Irish Data Protection Commission (DPC) has begun to pilot data privacy education modules in Irish classrooms. Is there a new DPC website yet? No When is it due? Soon When did the GDPR become enforceable? May 25th 2018 What date is it today? October 21st 2018  This is a bit of a cheat as it’s actually a link to a list of ten things to read from Privacy International. ‘Invisible Manipulation: 10 ways our data is being used against us’. If you don’t have time to read all those then you probably don’t have time to read books about privacy. So how about a review of a couple of books about privacy? Put one or both of these on your Christmas holidays reading list. As Facebook has loomed large over this issue we might as well wrap it up with this thread by Pat Walshe (@PrivacyMatters on Twitter, go and follow him if you’re not already) on Facebook’s ‘helpful’ submissions to the Kenyan government explaining what Facebook would like Kenyan data protection law to look like. If you’d prefer not to look at Twitter, (and who among us wouldn’t prefer that) here’s an unrolled version for your convenience. —- Endnotes & Credits The elegant Latin bon mot “Futuendi Gratia” is courtesy of Effin’ Birds. As always, a huge thank you to Regina Doherty for giving the world the phrase “mandatory but not compulsory”. The image used in the header is by Krystian Tambur on Unsplash. Any quotes from the Oireachtas we use are sourced from KildareStreet.com. They’re good people providing a great service. If you can afford to then donate to keep the site running. Digital Rights Ireland have a storied history of successfully fighting for individuals’ data privacy rights. You should support them if you can. Find us on the web at myprivacykit.com and on Twitter at @PrivacyKit. Of course we’re not on Facebook or LinkedIn. Barring a disaster this newsletter will be in your inbox again next weekend. See you then. Did you enjoy this issue? In order to unsubscribe, click here. If you were forwarded this newsletter and you like it, you can subscribe here. Powered by Revue Privacy Kit, Made with 💚 in Dublin, Ireland

Welcome to Issue 12! It’s mostly about Facebook. We wish it wasn’t but what can you do …

If you know someone who might enjoy this newsletter do please send it on to them.

😼

So Facebook didn’t have a great week. The New York Times reported that

A lawsuit was launched over fibs that were apparently told by Facebook about how many people watched videos and for how long, which ultimately led to many journalism jobs being lost, though the media companies are equally to blame for believing anything Facebook says, having been burned repeatedly by Zuckhole and his minions.

• ‘Was The Media’s Big “Pivot To Video” All Based On A Lie?’, Vanity Fair
• ‘Facebook, Corporate Bad Actor’, Talking Points Memo

In a carefully orchestrated effort to grab themselves a bit of positive coverage a group of journalists was invited to come and view Facebook’s grandiosely-titled War Room which houses the teams tasked with keeping elections safe while the rest of us sleep.

These stories were duly written up. As is often the case, the stories were embargoed until a particular time on a particular day. Unfortunately for Facebook a detailed story showing that Facebook-owned WhatsApp had been comprehensively gamed during the Brazilian presidential election broke on the same day.

For any reasonably normal publicly traded company a story reporting that shareholders were seeking to remove the chairman wouldn’t be the third or fourth most newsworthy item in any given news week but that’s what’s happened here.

In what we thought was a piece of peculiar timing Facebook announced their in-home surveillance kit a while back, shortly after revealing a large data breach. This device wasn’t collecting personal data, Facebook said. This device espoused the principles of privacy by design, Facebook said. You were in control, Facebook said.

It turns out that was a fib too. 

Seriously folks, don’t give Facebook (or Google or Amazon) your money for an always-on surveillance device which sits in your home. Even if they offer to pay you don’t put one of these things in your home. 

The European Data Protection Board is very keen that sanctions and other enforcement actions are applied consistently across member states. If so, a lot of the dubious CCTV schemes around Ireland (Limerick, we’re looking at you in particular) could find themselves facing tidy amounts in fines, considering this figure of €4,800 is for a single camera. 

It has taken the Austrian regulator no more than 4 months to issue their first fine for a GDPR violation. This decision by the regulator,…

Watch this space. One of the State’s largest hospitals appears to have taken off down their own path in implementing electronic health records, a programme which launched in the same week as the Minister for Health announced a significant investment by the European Investment Bank in a nationwide electronic health records programme.

Setting aside our usual focus on the privacy and data protection issues, of which there will doubtless be many, what odds would we get on these two systems having some integration problems in the future?

Hospital says system will be more efficient for patients and help reduce waiting times

Credit where credit is due, this is an excellent initiative from the Data Protection Commission.

The Irish Data Protection Commission (DPC) has begun to pilot data privacy education modules in Irish classrooms.

Is there a new DPC website yet? No

When is it due? Soon

When did the GDPR become enforceable? May 25th 2018

What date is it today? October 21st 2018 

This is a bit of a cheat as it’s actually a link to a list of ten things to read from Privacy International. ‘Invisible Manipulation: 10 ways our data is being used against us’.

If you don’t have time to read all those then you probably don’t have time to read books about privacy. So how about a review of a couple of books about privacy? Put one or both of these on your Christmas holidays reading list.

As Facebook has loomed large over this issue we might as well wrap it up with this thread by Pat Walshe (@PrivacyMatters on Twitter, go and follow him if you’re not already) on Facebook’s ‘helpful’ submissions to the Kenyan government explaining what Facebook would like Kenyan data protection law to look like. If you’d prefer not to look at Twitter, (and who among us wouldn’t prefer that) here’s an unrolled version for your convenience.

—-

Endnotes & Credits

• The elegant Latin bon mot “Futuendi Gratia” is courtesy of Effin’ Birds.
• As always, a huge thank you to Regina Doherty for giving the world the phrase “mandatory but not compulsory”.
• The image used in the header is by Krystian Tambur on Unsplash.
• Any quotes from the Oireachtas we use are sourced from KildareStreet.com. They’re good people providing a great service. If you can afford to then donate to keep the site running.
• Digital Rights Ireland have a storied history of successfully fighting for individuals’ data privacy rights. You should support them if you can.

Find us on the web at myprivacykit.com and on Twitter at @PrivacyKit. Of course we’re not on Facebook or LinkedIn.

Barring a disaster this newsletter will be in your inbox again next weekend. See you then.