Privacy by Design

The latest CDT Policy Post discusses the importance Privacy by Design. They extensively reference Anne Cavoukian (Ontario’s kickass Privacy Commissioner and author of Who Knows). The seven principles of Privacy by Design are: Proactive, not Reactive; Preventative, not Remedial Privacy as the Default Privacy Embedded into Design Full Functionality – Positive-Sum, not Zero-Sum End-to-End Lifecycle …

Homeland insecurity: Customs delays ambulance

Two weeks ago, US customs held up a fire truck, and a hotel burned to the ground. How do you top that? Delay an ambulance with a heart-attack victim. The incident happened last Monday, when 46-year-old Rick Laport needed emergency angioplasty — a procedure that couldn’t be performed at his Windsor, Ont., hospital. Medical officials rushed …

Homeland insecurity: Customs delays firefighters while hotel burns

Some Québec firefighters tried to help save a burning building. They didn’t get there in time. Why? US customs. Six volunteer firefighters rushing to assist a small-town fire department in upper New York State, part of a long-standing mutual-aid agreement, were held up while being grilled about their identification by a U.S. Customs official this …

LAX “security”

Qantas Airways chairman Margaret Jackson was detained and frisked at LAX last year: She said her briefcase had contained detailed plans of a new aircraft, including cross-section diagrams showing seat layouts, Australian newspaper the Herald Sun newspaper reported Wednesday. “The guy said ‘Why have you got all of this?’,” she said. “And I said, ‘I’m …

security screeners don’t

Bruce Schneier brings more bad news about US airport “security”: It seems like every time someone tests airport security, airport security fails. In tests between November 2001 and February 2002, screeners missed 70 percent of knives, 30 percent of guns and 60 percent of (fake) bombs. And recently (see also this), testers were able to …

how to think about security

Security is all about tradeoffs. Bruce Schneier has five steps you need to take when making a security-related decision: What problem does the security measure solve? How well does the security measure solve the problem? What other security problems does the measure cause? What are the costs of the security measure? Given the answers to …

no-fly chimpanzees etc.

Jesse points out another example of stupid security. Manitoba MP Pat Martin is being held up at airports: Pat Martin says he’s “getting fed up” with the screening procedures that have prompted frustrating ticket-counter delays with Air Canada on two occasions. “I can assure you I’m not a security risk, but I am about to …