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Tech shorts for October 6, 2015: Beneficent 'malware,' a facial-recognition protest, and blocking ads for the greater good
A white-hat hacker ‘infects’ browsers to protect them
Normally when you discover a virus on one of your systems you rush to remove it and hope it hasn’t done any serious damage. But at least one hacker is releasing a virus designed to protect the Linux routers it “attacks.” Computerworld’s Peter Sayer reports in an October 2, 2015, article that a piece of malware called Linux.Wifatch has been tracked by Symantec security researchers since last January.
It turns out, the virus has been around since at least 2013, but no one knew what it was designed for – it didn’t appear to affect the systems on which it was found. Symantec claims that Linux.Wifatch is intended to keep other viruses from capitalizing on the same code defect that it used to install itself on the machine. Infected systems communicate via a peer-to-peer network to distribute updates about other malware threats, according to the researchers. The virus can also remove other malware it finds, and its code is in plain sight, which Symantec claims is an indication of the author’s good intentions.
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Artist creates masks to protest public facial recognition
Chicago is a surveillance lover’s paradise. The mayor is quoted in an ACLU report from 2012 (pdf) as predicting that there would be a video camera recording events on nearly every block of the city by 2016. Operation Virtual Field is a network of 24,000 cameras that can identify an individual based on their face and call up files associated with them automatically.
One of the problems with the current state of public facial recognition is the high level of false positives, as the Daily Dot’s Joseph Cox writes in a September 14, 2014, article. Leo Selvaggio, an artist who lives in Chicago, is attempting to counter the facial-recognition network in his city by creating and distributing masks that bear his likeness. Selvaggio’s URME Personal Surveillance Identity Prosthetic is close enough to the artist’s own facial features to fool the camera network, yet inconspicuous enough to be worn without the wearer calling attention to themselves, according to Selvaggio.
Facial scans are more dangerous from a privacy perspective than fingerprints, iris scans, and most other common forms of biometrics because your face can be scanned in public settings without your knowledge or consent. No, the artist doesn’t expect masks such as those he provides to become a standard component of modern wardrobes. He insists that the project’s goal is merely to raise awareness of the threats to privacy posed by new technologies such as facial recognition.
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Ad blocking as a political statement
Doc Searls is one of the sharpest minds in the technology biz. He has long been a proponent of Do Not Track and other privacy measures. In a September 25, 2015, post on his blog, Searls presents the sharp increase in the use of ad-blocking browser extensions and phone apps as a form of boycott. In fact, Searls calls it the “biggest boycott in human history.”
Searls points to two trends that spurred the increased adoption of ad blockers. In 2012, ad-supported commercial sites refused to honor Do Not Track. And from 2007 to 2011, adtech companies ramped up their retargeting efforts, which track us from site to site. That’s why you see the same ad on multiple sites as you browse.
Searls believes that we customers have to help marketers get past their attempts to gain our attention and trust through abuse and coercion. He states that ultimately, advertisers will realize that free customers beat captive ones; that genuine relationships beat those based on coercion; that volunteered, relevant personal data is worth more than that which is “involuntarily fracked”; and that customers’ expressions of real intent are worth more than intent inferred from this fracked data.
Normally when you discover a virus on one of your systems you rush to remove it and hope it hasn’t done any serious damage. But at least one hacker is releasing a virus designed to protect the Linux routers it “attacks.” Computerworld’s Peter Sayer reports in an October 2, 2015, article that a piece of malware called Linux.Wifatch has been tracked by Symantec security researchers since last January.
It turns out, the virus has been around since at least 2013, but no one knew what it was designed for – it didn’t appear to affect the systems on which it was found. Symantec claims that Linux.Wifatch is intended to keep other viruses from capitalizing on the same code defect that it used to install itself on the machine. Infected systems communicate via a peer-to-peer network to distribute updates about other malware threats, according to the researchers. The virus can also remove other malware it finds, and its code is in plain sight, which Symantec claims is an indication of the author’s good intentions.
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Artist creates masks to protest public facial recognition
Chicago is a surveillance lover’s paradise. The mayor is quoted in an ACLU report from 2012 (pdf) as predicting that there would be a video camera recording events on nearly every block of the city by 2016. Operation Virtual Field is a network of 24,000 cameras that can identify an individual based on their face and call up files associated with them automatically.
One of the problems with the current state of public facial recognition is the high level of false positives, as the Daily Dot’s Joseph Cox writes in a September 14, 2014, article. Leo Selvaggio, an artist who lives in Chicago, is attempting to counter the facial-recognition network in his city by creating and distributing masks that bear his likeness. Selvaggio’s URME Personal Surveillance Identity Prosthetic is close enough to the artist’s own facial features to fool the camera network, yet inconspicuous enough to be worn without the wearer calling attention to themselves, according to Selvaggio.
Facial scans are more dangerous from a privacy perspective than fingerprints, iris scans, and most other common forms of biometrics because your face can be scanned in public settings without your knowledge or consent. No, the artist doesn’t expect masks such as those he provides to become a standard component of modern wardrobes. He insists that the project’s goal is merely to raise awareness of the threats to privacy posed by new technologies such as facial recognition.
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Ad blocking as a political statement
Doc Searls is one of the sharpest minds in the technology biz. He has long been a proponent of Do Not Track and other privacy measures. In a September 25, 2015, post on his blog, Searls presents the sharp increase in the use of ad-blocking browser extensions and phone apps as a form of boycott. In fact, Searls calls it the “biggest boycott in human history.”
Searls points to two trends that spurred the increased adoption of ad blockers. In 2012, ad-supported commercial sites refused to honor Do Not Track. And from 2007 to 2011, adtech companies ramped up their retargeting efforts, which track us from site to site. That’s why you see the same ad on multiple sites as you browse.
Searls believes that we customers have to help marketers get past their attempts to gain our attention and trust through abuse and coercion. He states that ultimately, advertisers will realize that free customers beat captive ones; that genuine relationships beat those based on coercion; that volunteered, relevant personal data is worth more than that which is “involuntarily fracked”; and that customers’ expressions of real intent are worth more than intent inferred from this fracked data.
