LocationSmart – Page 2 – Network Securitas

June 22, 2018

Supreme Court: Police Need Warrant for Mobile Location Data

This post was originally published on this siteThe U.S. Supreme Court today ruled that the government needs to obtain a court-ordered warrant to gather location data on mobile device users. The decision is a major development for privacy rights, but experts say it may have limited bearing on the selling of real-time customer location data by the wireless carriers to third-party companies. Image: Wikipedia. At issue is Carpenter v. United States, which challenged a legal theory the Supreme Court outlined more than 40 years ago known as the “third-party doctrine.” The doctrine holds that people who voluntarily give information to […]

September 12, 2018

U.S. Mobile Giants Want to be Your Online Identity

This post was originally published on this siteThe four major U.S. wireless carriers today detailed a new initiative that may soon let Web sites eschew passwords and instead authenticate visitors by leveraging data elements unique to each customer’s phone and mobile subscriber account, such as location, customer reputation, and physical attributes of the device. Here’s a look at what’s coming, and the potential security and privacy trade-offs of trusting the carriers to handle online authentication on your behalf. Tentatively dubbed “Project Verify” and still in the private beta testing phase, the new authentication initiative is being pitched as a way […]

April 29, 2024

FCC Fines Major U.S. Wireless Carriers for Selling Customer Location Data

This post was originally published on this siteThe U.S. Federal Communications Commission (FCC) today levied fines totaling nearly $200 million against the four major carriers — including AT&T, Sprint, T-Mobile and Verizon — for illegally sharing access to customers’ location information without consent. The fines mark the culmination of a more than four-year investigation into the actions of the major carriers. In February 2020, the FCC put all four wireless providers on notice that their practices of sharing access to customer location data were likely violating the law. The FCC said it found the carriers each sold access to its […]