tracking – WERU 89.9 FM Blue Hill, Maine Local News and Public Affairs Archives

Notes from the Electronic Cottage 2/7/19

Producer/Host: Jim Campbell

Facial Recognition Update 2019

“Imagine a government tracking everywhere you walked over the past month without your permission or knowledge. Imagine a database of everyone who attended a political rally that constitutes the very essence of free speech…” Words of some tin-hat wearing technophobe? Nope, the words of Brad Smith, President of Microsoft, talking about the potential of uncontrolled use of facial recognition technology, a technology whose uses he and many others feel requires government oversight. Here’s why.

Notes from the Electronic Cottage 8/16/18

Producer/Host: Jim Campbell

On today’s summer rebroadcast, we think a bit about all the data that fitness monitors and cars generate and what they can reveal about where we go, what we do, when we do it, and, not surprisingly, who we are.

Notes from the Electronic Cottage 9/1/16

Producer/Host: Jim Campbell

These days, there are lots of ways besides cookies that companies are using to track us as we move around the Web. A recent research paper refers to these new tracking tools as “fingerprinting.” Here’s how some of them work. If you’d like to see just how your computer can be identified by some of these tools, go to panopticlick.eff.org. You will probably be surprised – and maybe dismayed.

Notes from the Electronic Cottage 7/16/12

Producer/Host: Jim Campbell

Cell phones and smart phones are terrifically convenient but they also contain a lot of information about where we’ve been, where we are now, and, maybe, where we’ll be in the future. Lots of people would like to grab that information, and lots of it is being grabbed right now.