Recent incidents such as Target’s security breach, the Heartbleed bug, and eBay’s systems hack have called attention to how much consumers trust the businesses they patronize to keep their personal information safe. That trust currently appears to be hard to come by. Just 21% of Americans have “a lot of […] Read more »
More Americans Oppose Edward Snowden’s Actions Than Support Them
More Americans oppose Edward Snowden’s decision to flee the U.S. with thousands of stolen documents and reveal confidential details about the National Security Agency’s surveillance programs than those who support his actions, according to a new NBC News poll. … Yet, the nation’s opinion of the former government contractor turned world’s […] Read more »
Think Internet Data Mining Goes Too Far? Then You Won’t Like This
These days, you can hop on the Internet and buy yourself a consumer-grade brain scanning device for just a few hundred dollars. Technically, they’re called brain computer interfaces, or BCIs. As these devices develop, researchers are thinking a few steps ahead — they’re worried about how to keep marketers from […] Read more »
Brokers use ‘billions’ of data points to profile Americans
Data brokers that quietly gather billions of pieces of data on Americans should be required to operate more openly, so that those categorized as “financially challenged” or possibly suffering from serious medical conditions have the ability to check and challenge those characterizations, a federal report said Tuesday. The data broker […] Read more »
The changing nature of who produces and owns data: How will it impact survey research?
Survey researchers have become interested in big data because it offers potential solutions to problems we’re experiencing with traditional methods. Much of the focus so far has been on social media (e.g., Tweets), but sensors (wearable tech) and the internet Cloud Photoof things (IoT) are producing an increasingly rich, complex, […] Read more »
More online Americans say they’ve experienced a personal data breach
As news of large-scale data breaches and vulnerabilities grows, new findings from the Pew Research Center suggest that growing numbers of online Americans have had important personal information stolen and many have had an account compromised. CONT. Mary Madden, Pew Read more »