quote:

ORIGINAL: dcnovice

FR

Seen on social media: "They spy on you through your microwaves because they know it's the one place you can't put tin foil."

quote:

ORIGINAL: dcnovice

FR

Seen on social media: "They spy on you through your microwaves because they know it's the one place you can't put tin foil."

quote:

The popular TV maker Vizio began in 2014 to incorporate software into its TV sets to collect information about our viewing habits on a second-by-second basis. Then, working with a data analytics company, they were able to associate that data with very detailed and specific personal information of the viewers. Yes, Vizio sold you a TV set and turned around and spied on you as a thank you for your business!
Vizio installed the software on 11 million TV sets without ever asking for permission or informing their owners that they were collecting the data. After a lawsuit was filed by the FTC and the state of New Jersey, Vizio settled and paid a fine of $2.2 million.

quote:

Since My Friend Cayla has the potential to steal the information of the children who play with it, she is a no-no in Germany. The doll has been removed from the market by the Federal Network Agency, and parents who have already purchased Cayla are actually expected to destroy her. Seem a little extreme? Maybe not when it comes to small children.


Consumerist explains how the toy operates:

They connect via Bluetooth to a mobile phone app, usually belonging to a parent, and then from there access the internet in order to interact with kids and answer their questions. To accomplish that feat, the apps record and collect conversations between the toys and the kids, and use speech-to-text protocols to turn kids’ questions into searchable queries.

When users first set up the app for their toy, they may be sharing data you don’t want shared. Cayla in particular asks for multiple pieces of personal information — the child’s name, their parents’ names, their school name, their hometown, among other questions — so it can converse more naturally. The app also allows for location setting, and both the Cayla and i-Que apps collect users’ IP addresses.

If that doesn't creep you out, maybe this will: the information is then transmitted to the servers at the headquarters of Nuance Communications, the company that provides Cayla with her voice-parsing services.

quote:

Unsubstantiated claims by US President Donald Trump that he was wiretapped by Barack Obama were not meant literally, the White House press secretary says.

Sean Spicer said Mr Trump had broadly meant "surveillance and other activities" when he made the allegation in a tweet earlier this month.

He also suggested the president was not accusing his predecessor specifically

quote:

Former Democratic Rep. Dennis Kucinich said Monday that people shouldn’t be so quick to dismiss President Trump’s claim of being wiretapped. The reason? It happened to him.

In an interview with Fox News’s Bill O’Reilly on Monday, Kucinich recalled how a phone call from a foreign leader to his congressional office was tapped in 2011—a fact he learned of after leaving office.

"I had a resolution in the House to try to stop the war and [Saif el-Islam Qaddafi, son of Libya’s former President Moammar Qaddafi and a high-ranking official in the country’s government] called me to talk about it," Kucinich said.

"I cleared the discussion with House attorneys and a member of Congress is not supposed to be listened to by the executive branch," he added. "The Director of National Intelligence under President Obama was tracking my resolution and I didn't find out until two years after I had left Congress."

Kucinich had learned of the secret recording in 2015 when reporters from the Washington Times approached him about it, wanting confirmation that it was indeed him on the tape.

“At the time I was leading efforts in the House to challenge the Obama administration’s war against Libya. The Qaddafi government reached out to me because its appeals to the White House and the State Department to forestall the escalating aggression had gone unanswered,” Kucinich wrote in column on FoxNews.com.

He also said he doesn’t know if his call with the Libyan official was the only one recorded during his time in office.

“I have never gone public with this story, but when I saw the derision with which President Trump’s claims were greeted—and notwithstanding our political differences—I felt I should share my experience,” he wrote.

quote:

ORIGINAL: Politesub53

Loved kellyannes suggestion that Obama had bugged the microwaves.

quote:

ORIGINAL: bounty44
(oh no comrades, !)

(on no comrades, !)

quote:

ORIGINAL: Edwird

quote:

ORIGINAL: bounty44
(oh no comrades, !)

(on no comrades, !)

Wow, you really are 100% on board with this new Putin alliance, I see.

Well that being the case, we might as well get the cultural acclimation ball rolling here, for you and all the others in our new "'Friends of Vladimir Club."

I've been a big fan of Prokofiev and Shostakovitch for years, but that's probably a bit rich for newcomers (and none of it cartoonishly simple enough for the simpletons at hand, here), so we'll start out with something that all the new 'komrade's kids' can clap their hands to. Just please promise not to try singing, thank you.

Troika

quote:

ORIGINAL: BoscoX

Had Bush been president when the latest CIA scandal broke your faux red-faced outrage would have been the stuff of faux legends

But the affirmative action president was in charge so it's "nothing to see here" as always

quote:

ORIGINAL: Milesnmiles

quote:

ORIGINAL: BoscoX

Had Bush been president when the latest CIA scandal broke your faux red-faced outrage would have been the stuff of faux legends

But the affirmative action president was in charge so it's "nothing to see here" as always

Have kind of a short memory, do you? Have you forgotten? Bush was wiretapping everyone.
;-)

quote:

ORIGINAL: WhoreMods

quote:

ORIGINAL: Edwird
I've been a big fan of Prokofiev and Shostakovitch for years, but that's probably a bit rich for newcomers (and none of it cartoonishly simple enough for the simpletons at hand, here), so we'll start out with something that all the new 'komrade's kids' can clap their hands to. Just please promise not to try singing, thank you.

Troika

Maybe they could start off with some Mussorgsky? They can build up to actual orchestral recordings by listening to the ELP version of Pictures At An Exhibition...