This opinion piece was originally published in Dark Reading. School systems don’t seem like attractive targets, but they house lots of sensitive data, such as contact information, grades, health records, and more. Schools are starting to reopen around the country – some physically, some virtually, and some a hybrid of the two. As a result, the […]

The post Don’t Forget Cybersecurity on Your Back-to-School List appeared first on Internet Society.

This opinion piece was originally published in SC Magazine. With social distancing the norm, we’re spending more time on the Internet doing more important things than ever – eg, working, learning, banking, trading, shopping, seeing the doctor and having family time – as well as streaming, gaming and interacting with our connected speakers. Shouldn’t we be certain, […]

The post Now Is Not the Time to Put Everyone’s Security on the Line appeared first on Internet Society.

Beware of false promises and threats to encryption security online. It’s easy to understand why United States Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) Director Christopher Wray would ask companies to provide a means for law enforcement to access private data and communications. “We’re all for strong encryption and… we are not advocating for ‘backdoors,'” he said […]

The post A Backdoor Is a Backdoor Is a Backdoor appeared first on Internet Society.

On 7 October 2019, the Internet Society’s Online Trust Alliance (OTA) released the Online Trust Audit for 2020 U.S. Presidential Campaigns. Overall, 30% of the campaigns made the Honor Roll, and 70% had a failure, mainly related to scores for their privacy statements. As part of this process, OTA reached out to the campaigns, offering […]

The post Online Trust Audit for 2020 Presidential Campaigns Update appeared first on Internet Society.

One of the best practices we advocate and measure in our Online Trust Audit is that privacy statements should have a date stamp visible at the top of the page. This is an issue of transparency and lets readers know when the statement was last updated. Combined with another advocated best practice – access to […]

The post How “Fresh” is That Privacy Statement? appeared first on Internet Society.

With great power comes great responsibility. Online marketplaces, such as Amazon, are becoming increasingly common. But can consumers count on these marketplaces to help safeguard their privacy? On Monday, coinciding with Amazon Prime Day, the Internet Society partnered with Mozilla and other organizations to publish An Open Letter to Amazon about Privacy. We call for […]

The post Accessible, Clear, and Appropriate: An Open Letter to Amazon on Privacy Policies appeared first on Internet Society.

Last week we released the 10th Online Trust Audit & Honor Roll, which is a comprehensive evaluation of an organization’s consumer protection, data security, and privacy practices. If you want to learn more about this year’s results, please join us for our webinar on Wednesday, 24 April, at 1PM EDT / 5PM UTC. Today, though, […]

The post 10 Years of Auditing Online Trust – What’s Changed? appeared first on Internet Society.

We spent last week at the Consumer Electronics Show (aka CES) in Las Vegas, with over 180,000 of our closest friends. And with 4,500 exhibitors present, you’d have less than 30 seconds at each booth if you wanted to talk to all of them. Many articles have covered the cool new things, so in this […]

The post Consumer Electronics Show: Everything’s Connected, But What About Security and Privacy? appeared first on Internet Society.

As we approach the holiday buying season, excitement is building for all the new IoT gadgets – “smart” everything for the home, fitness/health trackers and a plethora of connected children’s toys. But this excitement should come with a giant asterisk: * Are these products safe? We’ve all seen the horror stories – hacked baby monitors, […]

The post Inspecting Gadgets: Don’t Forget the Asterisk When Buying Smart Devices appeared first on Internet Society.

October is National Cybersecurity Awareness Month, and as part of our work with the Online Trust Alliance and our Internet of Things (IoT) campaign, we think October also deserves another label… International IoT Security and Privacy Month. There are a number of significant activities and developments related to security and privacy. Here are a few […]

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A colleague just received an “Urgent Security Alert – Action Requested” email from Nest. At first glance it looked like either a phishing attempt or one of the way-too-often breach notifications we all receive these days. Instead, it was a real alert notifying him that the password he uses for his Nest account had been […]

The post Nest Alert: Protection From Pwned* Passwords appeared first on Internet Society.

I used to love the old Space Invaders arcade game – waves of enemy attackers came in faster and faster while you tried to defend your base. With experience you could learn their tactics and get pretty adept at stopping them. For today’s enterprise IT staff, consumer-grade IoT devices must certainly feel like those space […]

The post Space Invaders – Consumer Grade IoT in the Enterprise appeared first on Internet Society.

In advance of Data Privacy & Protection Day, the Online Trust Alliance, an Internet Society initiative, just released the Cyber Incident & Breach Trends Report (press release here), a look back at the cyber incident trends in 2017 and what can be done to address them. This report marks the tenth year OTA has provided […]

The post The Cyber Incident Tsunami – Time to Get Ready appeared first on Internet Society.

Today the OTA released the 9th annual Online Trust Audit and Honor Roll. This year’s Audit is our most comprehensive ever, assessing more than 1000 consumer-facing sites for their adoption of best practices in consumer/brand protection, site security and responsible privacy practices. Each year the audit raises the bar, using criteria that reflect the latest regulatory environment, attack […]

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The post Don’t Be a Tool – Verifying Subscriptions and Honoring Unsubscribes appeared first on Internet Society.