Facebook admits millons of unencrypted passwords were accessible by employees March 21, 2019 Millions of unencrypted Facebook passwords were accessible by more than 20,000 employees, the social media giant has admitted. A data protection failure going back as far as 2012 saw up to 600m passwords stored in plain text, according to security researcher Brian Krebs. Read more: Facebook blames server problem for worst outage ever The company [...]
Police association headquarters hit by malware cyber attack March 21, 2019 The association for British police officers has been hit by a malware attack at its Surrey headquarters. The Police Federation of England and Wales (PFEW) today said it fell victim to an attack on 9 March, and said it had put steps in place to isolate the impact and reduce the risk of it spreading. Read [...]
Facebook, Cambridge Analytica, and your data – a look back one year after the personal data scandal March 21, 2019 Last Sunday marked the first anniversary of newspapers breaking the story of Cambridge Analytica. The Guardian and the New York Times revealed that the British political consulting firm had been able to harvest the personal data of millions of Facebook users without permission. Cambridge Analytica had to file for insolvency just a few months after [...]
Finland to probe Nokia phones over reports they sent data to China March 21, 2019 Data protection authorities in Finland are set to launch an inquiry into Nokia-branded phones following reports the handsets sent data to China. Norwegian media today reported the Nokia 7 Plus model, which is built by Finnish firm HMD, had suffered a data breach that had resulted in data being sent to China. Read more: Nokia [...]
Challenger banks Oaknorth and Monzo team up to launch savings accounts March 21, 2019 Fintech banks Oaknorth and Monzo have launched a partnership that will allow Monzo users access to a high-interest savings account for the first time. The challenger bank tie-up will allow customers to open a range of savings accounts, with rates of up to 1.55 per cent, within minutes in the Monzo app. An easy-access cash [...]
Apple reveals UK pricing for new Airpods ahead of TV streaming service launch March 20, 2019 Apple has updated its wireless Airpods headphones before a likely launch of its very own streaming service. Read more: Netflix will not partner with Apple’s streaming service The tech giant’s new set of Airpods will boast a better battery life, Apple’s new, more powerful chip, as well as the option of a wireless charging case. [...]
Cyber attacks could now cost the UK economy £1bn per year, research reveals March 20, 2019 Distributed denial-of-service (DDoS) cyber attacks may now cost the UK economy more than £1bn every year, new research has revealed. The majority of business affected by DDoS attacks, which infect a network and block users from accessing it, suffered network outages costing on average £140,000, according to research firm Netscout. Read more: FTSE firms must [...]
Brits want a human driver ready to take control in their driverless cars March 20, 2019 The majority of Brits are still sceptical about driverless cars ever being allowed to become truly “autonomous”, according to research. Just one-in-seven people think autonomous vehicles (AVs) should be able to travel without a human occupant ready to take the wheel, according to an Opinium survey. Read more: GM takes stake in British startup as [...]
Google hit with €1.5bn EU penalty for ‘killing competition’ with Adsense advertising practices March 20, 2019 Google has been hit with a €1.49bn (£1.28bn) fine for abusing its dominant online advertising market position. Read more: Google Doodle celebrates 30th anniversary of the World Wide Web The European Commission accused the tech giant of preventing rivals from gaining a foothold in the market it loomed over with its Adsense software, thereby denying [...]
Emojis are a better metric for national wellbeing than traditional data methods March 20, 2019 HMRC’s programme to make tax digital continues to roll out. Anyone with a small business will know about the imminent deadline of 1 April, when VAT returns become digital. Quick to seize an opportunity, several companies have developed software to ease the task. The digitisation of tax raises the wider issue of whether technology will [...]