The developers of a 'son of cookie' web monitoring system have received a Proof of Concept grant from Scottish Enterprise to commercialise the system. Their non-cookie based web monitoring software does not (as indeed the name suggests) rely on cookies, but instead is intended to replace them with something far more powerful.

[ ... ]

So you can just say no, right? Up to a point, we'd hazard. If it were absolutely clear that users would be warned and given the ability to refuse it, then there would really be no need for it to be pointed out that it is "difficult to detect and delete." So you could speculate about it coming hardwired and unannounced in, say, a bank's client software, being rolled out for security and monitoring reasons to all of the clients in a company network, or being sent to Microsoft Outlook users "in order to have your advice."

We hope the "appropriate safeguards" will be sufficient to take care of that last one, but if it's as powerful and unobtrusive as they suggest, it's difficult to see how abuses can be blocked.

MIT's Technology Review - Spy, Then Innovate.

Software innovators and their more introspective customers may be better off using "remote diagnostics"--spy technologies that capture workers' activity in the natural environment--to anticipate customer use, instead of tabulating system crashes. How do users actually use new technology or follow new practices? What innovative new products, services and upgrades might these patterns suggest?

[ ... ]

Do nurses, doctors, airplane pilots and white-collar workers want to have their keystrokes captured and their movements recorded? Probably not. Do questions of privacy and proprietary use have to be negotiated anew? Of course. Innoveillance represents yet another battleground where innovators and their customers will clash over the future of value creation. But the fundamental observation remains the same: the ability to intelligently discriminate between how people actually behave and how they are supposed to behave is critical to understanding how ideas spread. The marginal cost of providing that kind of vision is declining; the marginal value of having that kind of vision is climbing. You can't see what you're not looking for. Open your eyes.

Political News from Wired News - House Keeps Focus on Cybercrime.

Computer criminals would face increased penalties, and Internet users would face greater surveillance by access providers, under a bill approved on Wednesday by a House of Representatives panel.

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The Judiciary Committee also changed the bill to require the Justice Department to report after one year how many times Internet providers had reported suspicious activity. Another amendment clarified that police officers do not need to be present while a search warrant is executed.

The bill has drawn support from Internet providers, who say current law places them in the awkward position of determining the gravity of threats made in their chat rooms or contained in customer e-mails.

But the Center for Democracy and Technology, a civil-liberties group, has said it could encourage law enforcement agencies -- or any government agency -- to pressure Internet providers to turn over their records without a search warrant, further eroding electronic privacy.

Sydney Morning Herald - Big Brother is looking to read your e-mail.

Police are increasingly turning to Internet Service Providers in a bid to fight crime - both online and off - but is this growing relationship doomed to endanger the privacy of Australian Internet users?

As the thin blue line stretches into cyberspace, tracking the trail of data is as important to investigators as finding fingerprints on a murder weapon is to homicide detectives. It is little wonder authorities are seeking to extend access to our electronic communications.

Proposed changes to the Telecommunications Interception Act - part of a package of anti-terrorism amendments - will make it easier for police to read a suspect's e-mail than it is to tap a phone or search premises.

So easy, it is raising privacy concerns for Internet users.

[ ... ]

Strictly controlled interception warrants are required before ISPs can hand over a message's contents.

All that is about to change, however, as Australian law-makers attempt to make e-mail something of a special case - so that reading e-mail stored on an ISP's server is not an interception of communication.

Irene Graham of the online civil liberties group Electronic Frontiers Australia, says the argument is a danger to privacy.

National Underwriter - Insurers Decry Internet Privacy Bill.

Insurance companies and agents are strongly opposing an Internet privacy bill they say could effectively destroy online sales of insurance.

The legislation, S. 2201, was introduced by Senate Commerce Committee Chairman Ernest F. Hollings, D-S.C., and could be voted on by the Committee as early as the week of May 11.

The legislation would establish strict rules governing the collection and disclosure of "sensitive" personal information--including name, address, phone number, health, race, political party, religious belief, sexual orientation, social security number or financial data--by Internet service providers or operators of commercial Web sites.

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She noted that S. 2201 allows for a private right of action over privacy breaches. This means, Ms. Berthoud said, that any leak of information would, more often than not, lead to a lawsuit.

CNN.com - EPIC takes aim at legislation affecting privacy.

(IDG) -- A privacy watchdog group is raising objections to a law that governs how financial institutions can use personal information, and to a bill in the U.S. House that calls for a national driver's license using biometric markers such as iris scans.

The Washington-based Electronic Privacy Information Center (EPIC) filed objections to the Gramm-Leach-Bliley Act with the U.S. Treasury Department and also said it opposes legislation calling for a national driver's license. Both measures hurt the cause of personal privacy, the group said.

CNN.com - KaZaA sneakware stirs inside PCs.

Millions find their PCs' bandwidth and hard disk space siphoned for mysterious but worthy-sounding scientific projects, just because they downloaded the client for a music- and file-swapping program.

But wait, there's more: The increasingly popular KaZaA file-sharing network will reap fees for allowing a partner to piggyback its dormant software on downloads of KaZaA's client. Within weeks, KaZaA users will see the premiere of ads offering Altnet audio and video content for sale. The selection will appear alongside -- but distinguishable from -- KaZaA content on the KaZaA Media Desktop, says Kevin Bermeister, chief executive of Brilliant Digital, parent company of Altnet.

The new offerings will appear in the company of banner ads from online advertising behemoth DoubleClick, with which KaZaA recently cut a deal. And if your PC shares its downtime processing cycles with Altnet, you could be paying for KaZaA Media Desktop services with a chunk of your PC rather than a lump of cash.

[ ... ]

On the chosen day, the slumbering software will be roused the next time the user connects to the KaZaA network. That activates the controversial software, a program called SecureInstall. It comes attached to Brilliant Digital's B3D projector, which is multimedia banner ad technology that is also automatically downloaded with the KaZaA client, says an Altnet spokesperson. KaZaA will prompt the user to upgrade to a new version of the KaZaA Media Desktop. Then, Brilliant Digital's SecureInstall will launch the download of a program to access the Altnet network. During the KaZaA client update, users will be able to opt out of the Altnet service, the spokesperson says. The company did not say this previously.

Altnet is actually both a software program and the access point to a parallel peer-to-peer network that runs concurrently with KaZaA. Only the Altnet network will distribute Altnet content; KaZaA uses the FastTrack network to share its files. Altnet is independent of KaZaA and could function even if KaZaA or the FastTrack network is shuttered, Bermeister says.

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