Heads up - "Constant Vigilance is the Price of freedom"

It appears my previous post regarding ‘Whatsapp’ privacy issues may have been unfounded; even a bit alarmist, for this I must apologise.

Evidently the messaging service used by UK residents [and the EU] is administered by an EU company based in Ireland and therefore is covered by EU privacy legislation which means no user information can be shared.

However, Facebook is due to move the UK out of the EU’s privacy jurisdiction at some point this year [2021], now that Brexit has been completed.

The social media giant told Reuters in December: “Like other companies, Facebook has had to make changes to respond to Brexit and will be transferring legal responsibilities and obligations for UK users from Facebook Ireland to Facebook Inc.”

It added: “There will be no change to the privacy controls or the services Facebook offers to people in the UK.”

Going by this, Facebook is saying Whatsapp will not share your data even after the transition.

However, it will legally be able to do so, so could go back on this at any point in the future.

As you have to agree to the new terms and conditions when they come; to keep using the system, there is no getting away from this situation and needs keeping an eye on.

https://inews.co.uk/news/technology/whatsapp-facebook-sharing-data-privacy-terms-update-policy-uk-users-explained-820838

Link verified.

A Telegram bot is flogging the phone numbers of Facebook users
Somthing else to cheer us up [Not!] and watch out for if you are a Facebook or Telegram user
Link verified.
https://www.techradar.com/uk/news/a-...facebook-users

NHS scam message, another to watch out for, link verified.

https://apple.news/ArcQJm28EQayQ59vTYbDYmg

New phishing attack uses Morse code to hide malicious URLs

A new targeted phishing campaign includes the novel obfuscation technique of using Morse code to hide malicious URLs in an email attachment. (96 kB)
Watch out for this in MS Excel attachments, mainly seems to have targeted Financial organisations so far, link is verified.

https://www.bleepingcomputer.com/news/security/new-phishing-attack-uses-morse-code-to-hide-malicious-urls/

PS for the [ex] Signallers; we knew those old Morse skills would come in handy one day.

Links verified, watch out Android users.

Anyone using the Android phone ShareIt app might want to try something in its place...https://threatpost.com/unpatched-and...alware/163976/

https://slack-imgs.com/?c=1&o1=wi32....touch-icon.pngthreatpost.com
Unpatched Android App with 1 Billion Downloads Threatens Spying, Malware
Attackers can exploit SHAREit permissions to execute malicious code through vulnerabilities that remain unpatched three months after app makers were informed.

Thousands of taxpayers' personal details potentially exposed online through councils' debt-chasing texts
Bulk SMS messages sent by local councils across the UK contained weblinks leading to pages that freely exposed to the public thousands of taxpayers' names, addresses, and outstanding debts.

Cardiff seems to be the only Welsh Council affected.

link verified. - https://www.theregister.com/2021/03/...exts_exposure/

In case it comes as a surprise, Big Brother(s) is watching...
Google collects 20 times more telemetry from Android devices than Apple from iOS | The Record by Recorded Future
Academic research published last week looked at the telemetry traffic sent by modern iOS and Android devices back to Apple and Google servers and found that Google collects around 20 times more telemetry data from Android devices than Apple from iOS.
Written by
Catalin Cimpanu
Est. reading time
5 minutes
link Verified

Data Stolen from 500 Million LinkedIn Users Leaked Online - https://www.ehackingnews.com/2021/04...-linkedin.html

This follows the recent 'Facebook' hack that has been in the news recently, might be worth changing your password just to be on the safe side, link verified.

One for 'Mac' users - link verified - https://www.scmagazine.com/home/secu...d-in-the-wild/
<time pubdate="" datetime="Mon, 26 Apr 2021 13:00:00 -0400" class="post-time -published">April 26, 2021 </time> Apple patches ‘worst macOS bug in recent memory’ after it was used in the wild

Bit technical but worth checking you have patched just in case.

Update Your Mac Now: Nasty Hack Breaks Apple Security To Take Sneaky Photos - https://www.forbes.com/sites/thomasbrewster/2021/05/24/update-your-mac-now-nasty-hack-breaks-apple-security-to-take-sneaky-photos/?sh=285b184620a0 - link verified