Motherboard is reporting on AI-generated voices being used for “swatting”: In fact, Motherboard has found, this synthesized call and another against Hempstead High School were just one small part of a months-long, nationwide campaign of dozens, and potentially hundreds, of threats made by one swatter in particular who has weaponized computer generated voices. Known as … Read More “Swatting as a Service” »
Category: police
Auto Added by WPeMatico
Here’s a story about a hacker who reprogrammed a device called “Flipper Zero” to mimic Opticom transmitters—to turn traffic lights in his path green. As mentioned earlier, the Flipper Zero has a built-in sub-GHz radio that lets the device receive data (or transmit it, with the right firmware in approved regions) on the same wireless … Read More “A Device to Turn Traffic Lights Green” »
Amazon has revealed that it gives police videos from its Ring doorbells without a warrant and without user consent. Ring recently revealed how often the answer to that question has been yes. The Amazon company responded to an inquiry from US Senator Ed Markey (D-Mass.), confirming that there have been 11 cases in 2022 where … Read More “Ring Gives Videos to Police without a Warrant or User Consent” »
Surely no one could have predicted this: The new proposal—championed by Mayor London Breed after November’s wild weekend of orchestrated burglaries and theft in the San Francisco Bay Area—would authorize the police department to use non-city-owned security cameras and camera networks to live monitor “significant events with public safety concerns” and ongoing felony or misdemeanor … Read More “San Francisco Police Want Real-Time Access to Private Surveillance Cameras” »
San Francisco police are using autonomous vehicles as mobile surveillance cameras. Privacy advocates say the revelation that police are actively using AV footage is cause for alarm. “This is very concerning,” Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF) senior staff attorney Adam Schwartz told Motherboard. He said cars in general are troves of personal consumer data, but autonomous … Read More “Surveillance by Driverless Car” »
Ever since Apple introduced AirTags, security people have warned that they could be used for stalking. But while there have been a bunch of anecdotal stories, this is the first vaguely scientific survey: Motherboard requested records mentioning AirTags in a recent eight month period from dozens of the country’s largest police departments. We obtained records … Read More “AirTags Are Used for Stalking Far More than Previously Reported” »
Brian Krebs has a detailed post about hackers using fake police data requests to trick companies into handing over data. Virtually all major technology companies serving large numbers of users online have departments that routinely review and process such requests, which are typically granted as long as the proper documents are provided and the request … Read More “Hackers Using Fake Police Data Requests against Tech Companies” »
Last summer, the San Francisco police illegally used surveillance cameras at the George Floyd protests. The EFF is suing the police: This surveillance invaded the privacy of protesters, targeted people of color, and chills and deters participation and organizing for future protests. The SFPD also violated San Francisco’s new Surveillance Technology Ordinance. It prohibits city … Read More “San Francisco Police Illegally Spying on Protesters” »
Moxie Marlinspike has an intriguing blog post about Cellebrite, a tool used by police and others to break into smartphones. Moxie got his hands on one of the devices, which seems to be a pair of Windows software packages and a whole lot of connecting cables. According to Moxie, the software is riddled with vulnerabilities. … Read More “Security Vulnerabilities in Cellebrite” »
Vice is reporting on a new police hack: playing copyrighted music when being filmed by citizens, trying to provoke social media sites into taking the videos down and maybe even banning the filmers: In a separate part of the video, which Devermont says was filmed later that same afternoon, Devermont approaches [BHPD Sgt. Billy] Fair … Read More “Deliberately Playing Copyrighted Music to Avoid Being Live-Streamed” »