Monthly archives: December, 2025

Pete Recommends – Weekly highlights on cyber security issues, December 20, 2025

Privacy and cybersecurity issues impact every aspect of our lives – home, work, travel, education, finance, health and medical records – to name but a few. On a weekly basis Pete Weiss highlights articles and information that focus on the increasingly complex and wide ranging ways technology is used to compromise and diminish our privacy and online security, often without our situational awareness. Four highlights from this week: Online Shoppers Beware — Study Finds Fake Delivery Sites Exploding Ahead of Holiday Rush; FBI Couldn’t Read Data Pointing to Pipe Bomb Suspect; Medicare.gov to deploy ID.me for beneficiary verification; and How to spot videos created by artificial intelligence.

Subjects: AI, Civil Liberties, Congress, Cybercrime, Cybersecurity, E-Commerce, E-Government, Economy, Healthcare, Privacy, Social Media, United States Law

January 1, 2026 is Public Domain Day: Works from 1930 are open to all, as are sound recordings from 1925!

This annual Domain Day review is by Jennifer Jenkins and James Boyle from the Center for the Study of the Public Domain. On January 1, 2026, thousands of copyrighted works from 1930 enter the US public domain, along with sound recordings from 1925. They will be free for all to copy, share, and build upon. The literary highlights range from William Faulkner’s As I Lay Dying to Agatha Christie’s The Murder at the Vicarage and the first four Nancy Drew novels. From cartoons and comic strips, the characters Betty Boop, Pluto (originally named Rover), and Blondie and Dagwood made their first appearances. Films from the year featured Marlene Dietrich, Greta Garbo, the Marx Brothers, and John Wayne in his first leading role. Among the public domain compositions are I Got Rhythm, Georgia on My Mind, and Dream a Little Dream of Me. We are also celebrating paintings from Piet Mondrian and Paul Klee. In this article you will read lists of some of the most notable books, characters, comics, and cartoons, films, songs, sound recordings, and art entering the public domain. After each of them, the authors have provided an analysis of their significance.

Subjects: Copyright, Education, Librarian Resources, Libraries & Librarians

AI in Finance and Banking, December 15, 2025

This semi-monthly column by Sabrina I. Pacifici highlights news, government documents, NGO/IGO papers, conferences, industry white papers and reports, academic papers and speeches, and central bank actions on the subject of AI’s fast paced impact on the banking and finance sectors. The chronological links provided are to the primary sources, and as available, indicate links to alternate free versions. Five highlights from this post: FCA sets out plans to help build mortgage market of the future; GDP Nowcasting Performance of Traditional Econometric Models vs Machine-Learning Algorithms: Simulation and Case Studies; UK banks turn to AI for fraud prevention and to improve services. Tools help detect organised crime, automate lending checks and deliver personalised financial offerings; Firms harness AI tools in search for competitive edge.

Subjects: AI in Banking and Finance, Economy, Financial System, Legal Research

Pete Recommends – Weekly highlights on cyber security issues, December 13, 2025

Privacy and cybersecurity issues impact every aspect of our lives – home, work, travel, education, finance, health and medical records – to name but a few. On a weekly basis Pete Weiss highlights articles and information that focus on the increasingly complex and wide ranging ways technology is used to compromise and diminish our privacy and online security, often without our situational awareness. Five highlights from this week: Your Boss Has More Ways Than Ever to Monitor What You’re Doing at Work; How to break free from smart TV ads and tracking; Every Legal Team Needs to See This LLM Leak; U.S. Plans to Scrutinize Foreign Tourists’ Social Media History; and A New Anonymous Phone Carrier Lets You Sign Up With Nothing but a Zip Code.

Subjects: AI, Cybercrime, Cybersecurity, Email Security, KM, Legal Research, Legal Technology, Privacy, Social Media, Spyware

Pete Recommends – Weekly highlights on cyber security issues, December 7, 2025

Privacy and cybersecurity issues impact every aspect of our lives – home, work, travel, education, finance, health and medical records – to name but a few. On a weekly basis Pete Weiss highlights articles and information that focus on the increasingly complex and wide ranging ways technology is used to compromise and diminish our privacy and online security, often without our situational awareness. Six highlights from this week: Admins and defenders gird themselves against maximum-severity server vulnerability; WhatsApp closes loophole that let researchers collect data on 3.5B accounts; Real or AI? The 7 Telltale Signs Every Fake Image Still Can’t Hide; Does a VPN really slow down your internet? I measured it; Google Starts Sharing All Your Text Messages With Your Employer; and Yep, Cloudflare died again. Here’s what happened.

Subjects: Computer Security, Cybercrime, Economy