Author archives

Pete Weiss, formerly a Systems Engineer in Teleprocessing at The Pennsylvania State University

Pete Recommends – Weekly highlights on cyber security issues, April 5, 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: What to Know About Trump’s Order to Phase Out Paper Checks; Apple faces $5 billion class action lawsuit over eBooks purchases; Why Encryption Matters for Your Data Backups (And How to Do It Easily); Texas’ AI-Powered Surveillance Arsenal Has Ballooned. Proposed Laws Provide Few Guardrails; and How to recognize and prevent deepfake scams.

Subjects: AI, Cryptocurrency, Cybercrime, Cybersecurity, Economy, Financial System, Privacy

Pete Recommends – Weekly highlights on cyber security issues, March 29, 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: Google Confirms Gmail Upgrade – 3 Billion Users Must Now Decide; What is Signal, the app where Trump officials texted war plans?; Even More Venmo Accounts Tied to Trump Officials in Signal Group Chat Left Data Public; NIST releases finalized guidelines on protecting AI from attacks; Canada – We partner with world-renowned scambusters to create our own fraud-fighting call centre.

Subjects: AI, Civil Liberties, Cybercrime, Cybersecurity, Encryption, Privacy, Search Engines, Search Strategies, Social Media, Technology Trends

Pete Recommends Weekly highlights on cyber security issues, March 22, 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: Memo details Trump plan to sabotage the Social Security Administration; Everything You Say To Your Fire TV & Echo Will Be Sent to Amazon Soon; The DNA of organised crime is changing – and so is the threat to Europe; Judge Rips DOGE Dig Into Social Security Records; and Big AI platforms can generate Chrome malware with this technique.

Subjects: AI, Cybercrime, Cybersecurity, Privacy, Search Engines

Pete Recommends – Weekly highlights on cyber security issues, March 15, 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: The 200+ Sites an ICE Surveillance Contractor is Monitoring; US cities warn of wave of unpaid parking phishing texts; OPM watchdog to investigate IT risks tied to DOGE’s agency access; and A Brand-New Botnet Is Delivering Record-Size DDoS Attacks.

Subjects: AI, Cybercrime, Cybersecurity, Privacy, Search Engines

Pete Recommends – Weekly highlights on cyber security issues, March 8, 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: 89% of enterprise AI usage is invisible to the organization; The Digital Packrat Manifesto; Cellebrite Is Using AI to Summarize Chat Logs and Audio from Seized Mobile Phones; and Flock Threatens Open Source Developer Mapping Its Surveillance Cameras.

Subjects: AI, Civil Liberties, Cybercrime, Cybersecurity, Legal Research, Privacy

Pete Recommends – Weekly highlights on cyber security issues, March 1, 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: Trump has purged government websites; The Wayback Machine is trying to preserve the record; Turn off your read receipts. They’re a security risk; You can now easily remove personal info from Google Search results; Google plans to end SMS verification in favor of QR codes; and Verizon isn’t doing enough to protect customers from robocall scams.

Subjects: Cybercrime, Cybersecurity, Email Security, Encryption, Privacy

Pete Recommends – Weekly highlights on cyber security issues, February 22, 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: Musk Ally Demands Admin Access to System That Lets Government Text the Public; How Phished Data Turns into Apple & Google Wallets; Identity is the Breaking Point—Get It Right or Zero Trust Fails; Chase Says Making Payments Over Social Media Is Too Messy, Will Block Zelle Transactions; and FTC Launches Inquiry into Big Tech Censorship Practices.

Subjects: AI, Communications, Cybercrime, Cybersecurity, Economy, Email Security, Encryption, Financial System, Legal Research

Pete Recommends – Weekly highlights on cyber security issues, February 8, 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: Federal workers: Here’s how to lock down your communications; Why rebooting your phone daily is your best defense against zero-click hackers; EFF – Basics | Surveillance Self-Defense; Even the US government can fall victim to cryptojacking; and Federal immigration officials have extensive technology at their disposal.

Subjects: Communications, Cryptocurrency, Cybercrime, Cybersecurity, Legal Research, Privacy

Pete Recommends – Weekly highlights on cyber security issues, February 1, 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: UnitedHealth now says 190 million impacted by 2024 data breach; A Tumultuous Week for Federal Cybersecurity Efforts; TikTok took a huge scoop of American users’ data and stored it in China – DeepSeek makes TikTok’s security issues look like child’s play; CVS Is Turning Locked Shelves Into an Excuse to Make You Download Its App; and Backdoor found in two healthcare patient monitors, linked to IP in China.

Subjects: AI, Big Data, Cryptocurrency, Cybersecurity, Email Security, Healthcare, Privacy, Search Engines, Social Media