September 2018 – Follow To Know

Facebook Says At Least 50 million Users Affected By Account Takeover Bug | TechCrunch

September 28, 2018 mdbincbi

Facebook has said 50 million user accounts may be at risk after hackers exploited a security vulnerability on the site. The company said in a blog post Friday that it discovered the bug earlier in the week. The bug is part of the site’s “View As” feature that lets a user see their profile as someone else. Facebook has switched off the “View As” feature in the meantime while it investigates the bug further. The bug allowed hackers to obtain account access tokens, which are used to keep users logged in…

‘It’s Terrifying’: Marketplace’s Smart Home Hacking Tests Reveal Major Privacy Concerns | CBC News

September 28, 2018 mdbincbi

All it took was a white van, a team of three hackers and a phishing email to remotely unlock Johanna Kenwood and Peter Yarema’s front door. The couple’s home in Oakville, Ont., is automated with a number of smart devices, including their lights, thermostat, security cameras and the deadbolt on their door. “I like the security and knowing what’s going on in my house when I’m away,” said Kenwood. And the couple enjoys the “convenience” of an automated home, said Yarema, for “some of the simpler things,” like when your…

Climate Change Is Causing Earth To Wobble On Its Axis, NASA Says | The Weather Channel

September 27, 2018 mdbincbi

Climate change is impacting how Earth spins on its axis, NASA says. Over the past century, Earth’s axis – the imaginary line that passes through the North and South Poles – has drifted about 4 inches, and a decrease in Greenland’s ice mass is the main contributor to the wobble, the space agency has announced. As temperatures increased throughout the 20th century because of humans, Greenland’s ice mass decreased. Rad full story here: Climate Change Is Causing Earth To Wobble On Its Axis, NASA Says | The Weather Channel

Ford And Panasonic Partner With Denver For V2X Car Communication | Digital Trends

September 26, 2018 mdbincbi

Panasonic’s Network Operations Center in Denver looks ripped straight from the pages of a Tom Clancy novel: Rows of computer workstations encircled by monitors, a wall of high-definition TVs, plush rolling chairs, call-center headsets, and urgently blinking LEDs, all soaked in surreal blue light. But they’re not tracking Soviet spies in here. Instead, the kind of guys who wear shirts patterned like graph paper are watching four colorful dots creep their way around the grid of a city map, like sedated Pac-Man ghosts. Each dot represents a real car, some…

Canadian Borrowers Will Feel This Week’s U.S. Interest Rate Hike: Don Pittis | CBC News

September 24, 2018 mdbincbi

Markets are so certain that U.S. Federal Reserve chair Jerome Powell will raise rates this week that a failure to hike would likely have worse consequences for American markets than the impact of higher borrowing costs. But the near certainty so cherished by market traders — who hate rude surprises — will provide little reassurance for the millions of people around the world, including over-borrowed Canadians, who will inevitably feel the effects of higher rates. And not only are market indicators showing a 100 percent expectation of a rate hike on Wednesday, most analysts expect another increase in December,…

RCMP And Privacy Commissioner Probe Alleged NCIX Data Breach | CBC News

September 23, 2018 mdbincbi

The RCMP and Office of the Information and Privacy Commissioner of British Columbia are investigating allegations of a possible data breach involving the bankrupt computer retailer NCIX. Authorities are investigating a claim that NCIX’s database servers have been advertised for sale online with all of the information still intact. In doing so, it may have compromised the security of countless customers. According to a statement from Richmond RCMP, the case was opened Thursday and police have seized the servers. Read full story here: RCMP And Privacy Commissioner Probe Alleged NCIX Data Breach | CBC News

Privacy Experts Say Choosing Life Insurance Tied To Fitness Tracking Could Have Unintended Consequences | CBC News

September 22, 2018September 22, 2018 mdbincbi

Privacy experts say they’re concerned life-insurance programs that reward customers for behaviours like logging their activity using a fitness tracker could have unintended consequences for the safety of their personal data. Insurance giant John Hancock, owned by Canadian company Manulife Financial Corp., announced Thursday a switch to “interactive” life-insurance policies only, which offer incentives for things like wearing a Fitbit or other fitness tracker. Customers in John Hancock’s program — a partnership with Vitality Group — do not have to log their activities to get coverage, but can receive discounts or other perks if they do. The…

Ontario Government Moves To Scrap Green Energy Act | CTV News

September 21, 2018 mdbincbi

TORONTO — The Ontario government has introduced legislation to scrap the Green Energy Act, which aimed to bolster the province’s renewable energy industry. Premier Doug Ford promised to repeal the act during the spring election campaign. The law was introduced by the previous Liberal government in 2009 under former premier Dalton McGuinty in a bid to grow the province’s solar and wind energy supply. Critics of the Green Energy Act have said it resulted in an increase in electricity costs and saw the province overpay for power it did not…

Hackers Have Planted Credit Card Stealing Malware On Local Government Payment Sites | TechCrunch

September 20, 2018 mdbincbi

Security firm FireEye has confirmed that a widely used web payment portal used to pay for local government services, like utilities and permits, has been targeted by hackers. Hackers have broken into self-hosted Click2Gov servers operated by local governments across the US, likely using a vulnerability in the portal’s web server that allowed the attacker to upload malware to siphon off payment card data over a period of “weeks to numerous months,” Nick Richard, principal threat intelligence analyst at FireEye, told TechCrunch. Read full story here: Hackers Have Planted Credit Card Stealing…

Will Your Cannabis Credit Card Purchases Be Visible To U.S. Border Officials? (Some Might, Some Won’t.) – National | Globalnews.ca

September 20, 2018 mdbincbi

Legalizing cannabis is a complicated business with lots of moving parts. The question of how a credit card marijuana purchase will appear on your statement would seem not to make a list of the top 50 issues. And it wouldn’t, except for two awkward facts: U.S. law allows border officials to ban Canadians for life from their country for using marijuana in this country, even when it’s legal here. (A senior official confirmed last week that they are willing to do this in practice.) Read full story here: Will Your Cannabis Credit…