Security News
The UK government has set in train plans to introduce legislation requiring tech companies to let it know when they plan to introduce new security technologies and could potentially force them to disable when required. They could mean the Home Office get advance access to technical details of security measures employed by popular big tech platforms so it can access user data and monitor nefarious activity.
A "Debt management company" is itself facing a bill from Britain's data regulator for sending hundreds of thousands of text messages to households that opted not to receive marketing junk mail. Misery loves company, and another entry in the ICO hall of shame this week is MCP Online, which is nursing a £55,000 penalty for making an unspecified number of "Unsolicited financial services calls about pensions," the ICO said.
Global leaders from 28 nations have gathered in the U.K. for an influential summit dedicated to AI regulation and safety. Day one of the AI Safety Summit culminated in the signing of the "Landmark" Bletchley Declaration on AI Safety, which commits 28 participating countries - including the U.K., U.S. and China - to jointly manage and mitigate risks from artificial intelligence while ensuring safe and responsible development and deployment.
A UK minister for policing has called for forces to double their use of algorithmic-assisted facial recognition in a bid to snare more criminals. Chris Philp MP, Minister of State for Crime, Policing and Fire, said both the use of live and retrospective facial recognition should increase following a commitment to spend £17.5 million on "a resilient and highly accurate system" to search all databases of images the police can access.
With the assent of King Charles, the United Kingdom's Online Safety Act has become law, one that the British government says will "Make the UK the safest place in the world to be online." The Online Safety Act, which began in April 2019 as the Online Harms White Paper when Theresa May served as Prime Minister and was passed by Parliament in September, aims to tame the internet.
Opinion The UK Extension to the EU-US Data Privacy Framework will enter into force on October 12, allowing certifying entities to easily transfer personal data from the UK to the US. Transferring personal data across the Atlantic would otherwise be prohibited under the UK General Data Protection Regulation without transfer mechanisms. As the UK is no longer a member of the European Union, the DPF does not automatically enable the transfer of personal data from the UK to the US. Transfers of personal data from the UK will require a Data Bridge.
Onstage at TechCrunch Disrupt 2023, Meredith Whittaker, the president of the Signal Foundation, which maintains the nonprofit Signal messaging app, reaffirmed that Signal would leave the U.K. if the country's recently passed Online Safety Bill forced Signal to build "Backdoors" into its end-to-end encryption. "We would leave the U.K. or any jurisdiction if it came down to the choice between backdooring our encryption and betraying the people who count on us for privacy, or leaving," Whittaker said.
Top admin, HR managers, devs go on transatlantic deny-list The US and UK governments named and sanctioned 11 Russians said to be connected to the notorious Trickbot cybercrime crew this week.…
The USA and the United Kingdom have sanctioned eleven Russian nationals associated with the TrickBot and Conti ransomware cybercrime operations. After numerous takedown attempts by the U.S. government, the Conti ransomware gang took control of the TrickBot operation and its development, using it to enhance more advanced and stealthy malware, such as BazarBackdoor and Anchor.
Comment Sanity appears to have prevailed in the debate over the UK Online Safety bill after the government agreed to ditch proposals - at least for the time being - to legislate the scanning of encrypted messages. In response to questions regarding the technical feasibility of scanning messages and the assessments that Ofcom must make, Lord Parkinson, a Digital, Culture, Media and Sport minister, said: "If the appropriate technology does not exist that meets these requirements, then Ofcom will not be able to use Clause 122 to require its use."