Google

https://www.washingtonpost.com/technology/2022/01/24/google-location-data-ags-lawsuit/

Attorneys general from D.C. and three states sued Google on Monday, arguing that the search giant deceived consumers to gain access to their location data.

The lawsuits, filed in the District of Columbia, Texas, Washington and Indiana, allege the company made misleading promises about its users’ ability to protect their privacy through Google account settings, dating from at least 2014. The suits seek to stop Google from engaging in these practices and to fine the company.

The complaints also allege the company has deployed “dark patterns,” or design tricks that can subtly influence users’ decisions in ways that are advantageous for a business. The lawsuits say Google has designed its products to repeatedly nudge or pressure people to provide more and more location data, “inadvertently or out of frustration.” The suits allege this violates various state and D.C. consumer protection laws.

https://www.vice.com/en/article/93bw8y/google-caught-hackers-using-a-mac-zero-day-against-hong-kong-users

The hackers had set up a watering hole attack, meaning they hid malware within the legitimate websites of “a media outlet and a prominent pro-democracy labor and political group” in Hong Kong. Users who visited those websites would get hacked with an unknown vulnerability—in other words, a zero-day—and another exploit that took advantage of a previously patched vulnerability for MacOS that was used to install a backdoor on their computers, according to Hernandez. 

Apple patched the zero-day used in the campaign in an update pushed out on September 23, according to the report.

https://www.nytimes.com/2021/09/17/world/europe/russia-navalny-app-election.html

The app, created by allies of the opposition leader Aleksei Navalny, vanished from online stores, reflecting a new level of pressure against U.S. technology companies in the country.

Friday’s move could embolden the Kremlin as well as governments elsewhere in the world to use the threat of prosecuting employees to gain leverage against the companies. It presents a test of Silicon Valley ideals around free expression and an open internet, balanced not only against profit but against the safety of their workers.

https://www.theverge.com/2021/6/21/22538240/google-chat-allo-hangouts-talk-messaging-mess-timeline

Google keeps falling into the same cycle, […], one that has repeated itself throughout the years. It’ll build out new services, integrating them into more areas of its product lineup, then try to wipe the slate clean, launch new services that (eventually) replace the old set, and start the cycle anew.

https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2021/03/googles-floc-terrible-idea

Google can choose to dismantle the old scaffolding for surveillance without replacing it with something new and uniquely harmful.

We emphatically reject the future of FLoC. That is not the world we want, nor the one users deserve. Google needs to learn the correct lessons from the era of third-party tracking and design its browser to work for users, not for advertisers.

https://www.youtube.com/watch

Tim Berners-Lee envisioned a “universal information system”. What went wrong?

https://www.zdnet.com/article/google-removes-android-app-that-was-used-to-spy-on-belarusian-protesters/

App mimicked a popular anti-government news site and collected location and device owner details.

https://www.reuters.com/article/us-hongkong-google-data/google-stops-responding-directly-to-data-requests-from-hong-kong-government-idUSKCN25A0HU

following the enactment of a new national security law imposed by China.

https://www.ctvnews.ca/mobile/sci-tech/canadian-smart-glasses-going-offline-weeks-after-company-bought-by-google-1.5042010

https://nrkbeta.no/2020/06/05/utviklerne-av-smittestopp-tester-na-teknologi-fra-apple-og-google/

Norske Simula tester Apple og Googles teknologi for kontaktsporing, men det er ikke klart om dagens app Smittestopp vil bli endret eller erstattet.