Did your Garmin watch suddenly stop working on Thursday? You’re not alone. The company suffered a suspected ransomware attack that disabled all of its online services. While Garmin hasn’t officially confirmed any details, many employees made statements on social media indicating the outages were caused by a ransomware attack. An internal Garmin memo obtained by Taiwanese tech news… Read More »
How to Manually Upload Your Garmin Workout Data

Facial recognition technology raises ethical dilemmas and privacy concerns. Is it okay that our phones, computers, and social media apps not only recognize us, but also collect and store data about our faces? These concerns grow as the tech becomes more accurate, and more government agencies, private businesses, and advertising agencies use it to track us.… Read More »
If You Won’t Wear a Mask to Stop Coronavirus, How About Surveillance?

Well, it could be worse. TikTok could be suffering some gigantic data breach that exposes your account credentials and private video snippets to the world. But the alternative isn’t much better, privacy-wise: a recent Wall Street Journal report found that the popular social network tracked Android users’ MAC addresses for at least… Read More »
TikTok Tracked Your MAC Address: Now What?

Bugs found in Alexa’s web services could have let hackers access voice recordings and personal data stored on Amazon’s servers. Some of the vulnerabilities could even let hackers remotely install Alexa Skills on someone else’s device without them knowing. Despite the severity of these flaws, you’re safe in this particular instance—but… Read More »
Regularly Delete Your Digital Assistant’s Voice History

An improperly-secured cloud database has exposed personal information for over 235 million TikTok, Instagram and YouTube accounts. The Hong Kong-based company Social Data was unknowingly storing the data in a database without proper password protection, meaning anyone could pop in and see it. Ugh. Cybersecurity firm Comparitech found and disclosed the vulnerability, which Social Data… Read More »
How to Deal With This TikTok, Instagram, and YouTube Data Breach

Readers who regularly attend protests are likely familiar with the Bridgefy messaging app, and may even use it. The app was initially envisioned as an “offline” communication network for use in rural communities, at times of high network congestion (like sporting events), or even amid natural disasters. The app uses Bluetooth and meshed router… Read More »
Don’t Use Bridgefy for Messaging at Protests

While, sure, anybody could just drive by your house to see what it looks like—all the tin foil in the world isn’t going to shield you from that privacy “violation,” though a fence might help—you can make it harder for people to see your home on Google Maps. The solution involves blurring out… Read More »
How to Blur Your House in Google Maps’ Street View

Google is rolling out new features for its current video chat apps, Googles Meet and Duo. Meet’s updates include a new background blurring tool; it also now allows users to view up to 49 camera feeds while using the “tile view” in large group meetings. Duo’s “new” feature isn’t all that new: Google is restoring the screen share… Read More »
How to Blur Your Background in Google Meet

Blocking website trackers is easy. Several popular web browsers block ads and trackers by default, and there are plenty of third-party apps and browser add-ons that can fill in the gaps where needed. But have you ever wondered what, exactly, these helpful tools are actually blocking? For an easy way to see everything a website tracks… Read More »
Scan Websites for Annoying Data Trackers With ‘Blacklight’

Google collects data on everything you do while using its products and services. Sometimes this data is sold to advertisers; sometimes it’s used to make it easier to use Google’s products. For example, Google uses data from Gmail, Chat, and Meet to make the entire Google user experience more convenient, like… Read More »
Turn Off Gmail’s ‘Smart’ Features to Avoid Tracking

We all want to know who’s lurking on our social media profiles, but the truth is that none of the major social media platforms will let you access this information—not even if you’re a verified user. Despite this, there is an endless litany of third-party apps for Instagram that promise to:… Read More »
No, You Can’t Track Who Looks at Your Instagram

Many messaging apps let you send disappearing messages, but Signal’s approach to the process is one of the best. It’s another great reason to start using the encrypted chat app if you’re looking for privacy-focused messaging—or if you’re an Elon Musk fan. As the name implies, Signal’s disappearing messages self-destruct after a set amount of time.… Read More »
How to Send Disappearing Messages in Signal

Telegram’s new “People Nearby” feature shows a list of other nearby users and their approximate proximity to you, letting you create group chats based on geographic location. The feature is turned off by default and must be manually enabled by the user, but it’s an idiosyncratic addition for an app that markets… Read More »
Don’t Use Telegram’s New ‘People Nearby’ Feature