jd writes: Ars Technica is reporting a newly-discovered man-in-the-middle attack against SSH. This only works if you are using "ChaCha20-Poly1305" or "CBC with Encrypt-then-MAC", so it isn't a universal flaw. The CVE numbers for this vulnerability are CVE-2023-48795, CVE-2023-46445, and CVE-2023-46446.

From TFA:

At its core, Terrapin works by altering or corrupting information transmitted in the SSH data stream during the handshake -- the earliest stage of a connection, when the two parties negotiate the encryption parameters they will use to establish a secure connection. The attack targets the BPP, short for Binary Packet Protocol, which is designed to ensure that adversaries with an active position can't add or drop messages exchanged during the handshake. Terrapin relies on prefix truncation, a class of attack that removes specific messages at the very beginning of a data stream.

The Terrapin attack is a novel cryptographic attack targeting the integrity of the SSH protocol, the first-ever practical attack of its kind, and one of the very few attacks against SSH at all. The attack exploits weaknesses in the specification of SSH paired with widespread algorithms, namely ChaCha20-Poly1305 and CBC-EtM, to remove an arbitrary number of protected messages at the beginning of the secure channel, thus breaking integrity. In practice, the attack can be used to impede the negotiation of certain security-relevant protocol extensions. Moreover, Terrapin enables more advanced exploitation techniques when combined with particular implementation flaws, leading to a total loss of confidentiality and integrity in the worst case.

Amrita Khalid reports via The Verge: Proton has released a desktop version of its Proton Mail app that will give users full access to both Proton Mail and Proton Calendar and (eventually) the ability to view your emails offline. The desktop app is available in beta is optimized for both Windows and macOS, and encrypts sent emails end-to-end just like with the browser version, according to the Swiss company, while offline access to emails will be available "soon." [...] It's important to note that you'll still need internet access to both send and encrypt your emails on Proton. But the offline feature will let you view and draft emails while traveling, during a power outage, or any other situation where you don't have access to the internet.

Proton is also bringing encrypted auto-forwarding to paid users, both on its desktop and browser versions, though the encryption for forwards will only apply when the forwarded emails go to other Proton users. The company says it has made improvements to Proton Calendar, too, including a fully searchable web version. Not everyone will be able to access Proton's desktop app right away. Proton is restricting access to its paid "Visionary" tier for legacy users at first (though the company is reopening subscriptions to that tier through January 3rd, 2024). The plan is to make the desktop app available to all users in early 2024.

Google Maps will soon give you the option to store your location data on your device instead of in the cloud. Android Police reports: In the coming year, Google is planning to switch things up by defaulting to saving your Timeline directly on your device instead of the cloud. You'll also have the option to wipe out bits or the whole information dossier whenever you want and disable location history completely. When you're jumping ship to a new device and want to keep your data close, you always have the option to back it up in the cloud. Google assures you that it'll lock it up with encryption.

Another significant update is the shorter default amount of time before your location history is auto-deleted. Soon, when you turn on location history, the default auto-delete time shrinks to three months. In the past, it used to hang around for 18 months by default. If you're the sentimental type, you can extend the Timeline's lifespan or turn off the auto-delete option. Google Maps has another nifty trick up its sleeve: soon, you can erase all traces of your trips with just a few taps. Say you've got a favorite hangout spot and you want to keep it to yourself. You can wipe the slate clean right from the app, whether it's searches, directions, visits, or shares. This handy feature is making its debut on Maps for Android and iOS in the next few weeks.

Finally, you will soon be able to click on the blue dot on the map to view your Location History and Timeline at a glance. It allows you to tweak what you share and store on Maps, all without having to dive into the settings. Currently, the blue dot only gives you some neat shortcuts for parking saves and location sharing.

A 16-year-old high school student reverse engineered Apple's messaging protocol, leading to the launch of an interoperable Android app called "Beeper Mini".

But on Friday the Verge reported that "less than a week after its launch, the app started experiencing technical issues when users were suddenly unable to send and receive blue bubble messages." Reached for comment, Beeper CEO Eric Migicovsky did not deny that Apple has successfully blocked Beeper Mini. "If it's Apple, then I think the biggest question is... if Apple truly cares about the privacy and security of their own iPhone users, why would they stop a service that enables their own users to now send encrypted messages to Android users, rather than using unsecure SMS...? Beeper Mini is here today and works great. Why force iPhone users back to sending unencrypted SMS when they chat with friends on Android?"
Apple says they're unable to verify that end-to-end encryption is maintained when messages are sent through unauthorized channels, according to a statement quoted by TechCrunch: "At Apple, we build our products and services with industry-leading privacy and security technologies designed to give users control of their data and keep personal information safe. We took steps to protect our users by blocking techniques that exploit fake credentials in order to gain access to iMessage. These techniques posed significant risks to user security and privacy, including the potential for metadata exposure and enabling unwanted messages, spam, and phishing attacks. We will continue to make updates in the future to protect our users."
Beeper responded on X: We stand behind what we've built. Beeper Mini is keeps your messages private, and boosts security compared to unencrypted SMS. For anyone who claims otherwise, we'd be happy to give our entire source code to mutually agreed upon third party to evaluate the security of our app.
Ars Technica adds: On Saturday, Migicovsky notified Beeper Cloud (desktop) users that iMessage was working again for them, after a long night of fixes. "Work continues on Beeper Mini," Migicovsky wrote shortly after noon Eastern time.
Engadget notes: The Beeper Mini team has apparently been working around the clock to resolve the outage affecting the new "iMessage on Android" app, and says a fix is "very close." And once the fix rolls out, users' seven-day free trials will be reset so they can start over fresh.
Meanwhile, at around 9 p.m. EST, Beeper CEO Eric Migicovsky posted on X that "For 3 blissful days this week, iPhone and Android users enjoyed high quality encrypted chats. We're working hard to return to that state."

Data breaches and ransomware attacks are getting worse. Some 2.6 billion personal records have been exposed in data breaches over the past two years and that number continues to grow, according to a new report commissioned by Apple. From a report: Apple says the escalating intrusions, combined with increases in ransomware means the tech industry needs to move toward greater use of encryption. According to the report, prepared by MIT professor emeritus Stuart E. Madnick:

1. Data breaches in the US through the first nine months of the year are already 20% higher than for all of 2022.
2. Nearly 70 percent more ransomware attacks were reported through September 2023, than in the first three quarters of 2022.
3. Americans and those in the UK topped the list of those most targeted in ransomware attacks in 2023, followed by Canada and Australia. Those four countries accounted for nearly 70% of reported ransomware attacks.
4. One in four people in the US had their health data exposed in a data breach during the first nine months of 2023.

An anonymous reader quotes a report from Ars Technica: Meta has started enabling end-to-end encryption (E2EE) by default for chats and calls on Messenger and Facebook despite protests from the FBI and other law enforcement agencies that oppose the widespread use of encryption technology. "Today I'm delighted to announce that we are rolling out default end-to-end encryption for personal messages and calls on Messenger and Facebook," Meta VP of Messenger Loredana Crisan wrote yesterday. In April, a consortium of 15 law enforcement agencies from around the world, including the FBI and ICE Homeland Security Investigations, urged Meta to cancel its plan to expand the use of end-to-end encryption. The consortium complained that terrorists, sex traffickers, child abusers, and other criminals will use encrypted messages to evade law enforcement.

Meta held firm, telling Ars in April that "we don't think people want us reading their private messages" and that the plan to make end-to-end encryption the default in Facebook Messenger would be completed before the end of 2023. Meta also plans default end-to-end encryption for Instagram messages but has previously said that may not happen this year. Meta said it is using "the Signal Protocol, and our own novel Labyrinth Protocol," and the company published two technical papers that describe its implementation (PDF). "Since 2016, Messenger has had the option for people to turn on end-to-end encryption, but we're now changing personal chats and calls across Messenger to be end-to-end encrypted by default. This has taken years to deliver because we've taken our time to get this right," Crisan wrote yesterday. Meta said it will take months to implement across its entire user base. A post written by two Meta software engineers said the company "designed a server-based solution where encrypted messages can be stored on Meta's servers while only being readable using encryption keys under the user's control."

"Product features in an E2EE setting typically need to be designed to function in a device-to-device manner, without ever relying on a third party having access to message content," they wrote. "This was a significant effort for Messenger, as much of its functionality has historically relied on server-side processing, with certain features difficult or impossible to exactly match with message content being limited to the devices."

The company says it had "to redesign the entire system so that it would work without Meta's servers seeing the message content."

An anonymous reader quotes a report from TechCrunch: In 2015, as part of the wave of encrypting all the things on the internet, encouraged by the Edward Snowden revelations, Facebook announced that it would allow users to receive encrypted emails from the company. Even at the time, this was a feature for the paranoid users. By turning on the feature, all emails sent from Facebook -- mostly notifications of "likes" and private messages -- to the users who opted-in would be encrypted with the decades-old technology called Pretty Good Privacy, or PGP. Eight years later, Facebook is killing the feature due to low usage, according to the company. The feature was deprecated Tuesday. Facebook declined to specify exactly how many users were still using the encrypted email feature.

An anonymous reader shares a report: Beeper has been offering a unified messaging platform for a few years, allowing users to open a single app to communicate with contacts via SMS, Google Chat, Facebook Messenger, Slack, Discord, WhatsApp, and perhaps most significantly, iMessage. Up until this week though, Android users that wanted to use Beeper to send "blue bubble" messages to iMessage users had their messages routed through a Mac or iOS device. Now Beeper has launched a new app called Beeper Mini that handles everything on-device, no iPhone or Mac bridge required.

Beeper Mini is available now from the Google Play Store, and offers a 7-day free trial. After that, it costs $2 per month to keep using. [...] previously the company had to rely on a Mac-in-the-cloud? The company explains the method it's using in a blog post, but in a nutshell, Beeper says a security researcher has reverse engineered "the iMessage protocol and encryption," so that "all messages are sent and received by Beeper Mini Android app directly to Apple's servers" and "the encryption keys needed to encrypt these messages never leave your phone." That security researcher, by the way, is a high school student that goes by jjtech, who was hired by Beeper after showing the company his code. A proof-of-concept Python script is also available on Github if you'd like to run it to send messages to iMessage from a PC.

Sunbird, the app that brings iMessage to Android, has temporarily shut down the service over "security concerns." From a report: In a notice to users, Sunbird says it has "decided to pause Sunbird usage for now" while it investigates reports that its messages aren't actually end-to-end encrypted. Sunbird launched in 2022 as a messaging app that attempts to put the blue versus green bubble battle to rest. It has only been available to those who sign up for its waitlist, touting numerous privacy features, like end-to-end encryption, no message data collection, and no ads.

Last week, Sunbird partnered with Nothing, the phone brand owned by OnePlus co-founder Carl Pei, on the launch of Nothing Chats. The Sunbird-powered messaging service is supposed to let owners of the Phone 2 send texts via iMessage, but it was pulled from the Google Play Store just one day after its launch. At the time, Nothing said it had to fix "several bugs" within the app. However, its removal from the Play Store came around the same time a post from Texts.blog revealed that messages sent via Sunbird may not be end-to-end encrypted.

gaiageek writes: Of note, given the recent Slashdot article about Signal opening up to trying out usernames, is the $6 million annual cost of sending SMS messages for account verification, which certainly suggests that getting rid of phone number verification would be a significant cost-saving solution.

Proton Mail, the leading privacy-focused email service, is making its first foray into blockchain technology with Key Transparency, which will allow users to verify email addresses. From a report: In an interview with Fortune, CEO and founder Andy Yen made clear that although the new feature uses blockchain, the key technology behind crypto, Key Transparency isn't "some sketchy cryptocurrency" linked to an "exit scam." A student of cryptography, Yen added that the new feature is "blockchain in a very pure form," and it allows the platform to solve the thorny issue of ensuring that every email address actually belongs to the person who's claiming it.

Proton Mail uses end-to-end encryption, a secure form of communication that ensures only the intended recipient can read the information. Senders encrypt an email using their intended recipient's public key -- a long string of letters and numbers -- which the recipient can then decrypt with their own private key. The issue, Yen said, is ensuring that the public key actually belongs to the intended recipient. "Maybe it's the NSA that has created a fake public key linked to you, and I'm somehow tricked into encrypting data with that public key," he told Fortune. In the security space, the tactic is known as a "man-in-the-middle attack," like a postal worker opening your bank statement to get your social security number and then resealing the envelope.

Blockchains are an immutable ledger, meaning any data initially entered onto them can't be altered. Yen realized that putting users' public keys on a blockchain would create a record ensuring those keys actually belonged to them -- and would be cross-referenced whenever other users send emails. "In order for the verification to be trusted, it needs to be public, and it needs to be unchanging," Yen said.

Michael Kan reports via PCMag: Encrypted messaging service Signal is now testing usernames, which will offer people a more private way to share their contact details on the app. Signal kicked off the public test today through a new beta build available in its community forums. "After rounds of internal testing, we have hit the point where we think the community that powers these forums can help us test even further before public launch," says Signal VP of Engineering Jim O'Leary.

The development is a big deal since Signal -- an end-to-end encrypted messaging app -- has long required users to sign up with a phone number. That same number also needs to be shared in order to message other users on the app. This can be problematic since sharing your phone number exposes you to privacy and hacking risks. For example, a contact on Signal could choose to call and message your number over an unencrypted cellular network or pass off the number to someone else.

Tech groups have called on ministers to clarify the extent of proposed powers that they fear would allow the UK government to intervene and block the rollout of new privacy features for messaging apps. FT: The Investigatory Powers Amendment Bill, which was set out in the King's Speech on Tuesday, would oblige companies to inform the Home Office in advance about any security or privacy features they want to add to their platforms, including encryption. At present, the government has the power to force telecoms companies and messaging platforms to supply data on national security grounds and to help with criminal investigations.

The new legislation was designed to "recalibrate" those powers to respond to risks posed to public safety by multinational tech companies rolling out new services that "preclude lawful access to data," the government said. But Meredith Whittaker, president of private messaging group Signal, urged ministers to provide more clarity on what she described as a "bellicose" proposal amid fears that, if enacted, the new legislation would allow ministers and officials to veto the introduction of new safety features. "We will need to see the details, but what is being described suggests an astonishing level of technically confused government over-reach that will make it nearly impossible for any service, homegrown or foreign, to operate with integrity in the UK," she told the Financial Times.

An anonymous reader quotes a report from 404 Media: Hakan Ayik, an infamous drug trafficker who also popularized the use of certain brands of encrypted phones around the world, was arrested during a series of dramatic raids in Turkey last week. At one point a group of heavily armed Turkish tactical officers in brown and gray camouflage piled outside an apartment and banged on the door repeatedly. They then smashed the door down and moved inside with a riot shield, according to a video tweeted by Turkey's Minister of the Interior. The video then showed a photograph of Ayik, shirtless and on his knees while staring straight ahead, surrounded by multiple officers.

It was a moment that capped off the arrest of Australia's most wanted man, and a sign that Turkey is no longer a safe haven to organized criminals. But it was also something of a closing act on Anom, a brand of encrypted phone that the FBI secretly took over and managed for years after inserting a backdoor into the product, allowing agents to read tens of millions of messages sent across it. Ayik unknowingly helped the FBI gain that piercing insight into organized crime by selling the devices to other criminal associates. Given Ayik's position as a trusted authority on what communications tools drug traffickers should use, one associate even referred to him as the 'encryption king' in an Anom message I've seen. According to the Sydney Morning Herald, Ayik will not be extradited to Australia. Instead, Australian police are encouraging Turkish authorities to investigate and prosecute him as a Turkish citizen.

Mark Tyson reports via Tom's Hardware: A commercial smartphone or Linux computer can be used to crack RSA-2048 encryption, according to a prominent research scientist. Dr Ed Gerck is preparing a research paper with the details but couldn't hold off from bragging about his incredible quantum computing achievement (if true) on his LinkedIn profile. Let us be clear: the claims seem spurious, but it should be recognized that the world isn't ready for an off-the-shelf system that can crack RSA-2048, as major firms, organizations, and governments haven't yet transitioned to encryption tech that is secured for the post-quantum era.

In his social media post, Gerck states that a humble device like a smartphone can crack the strongest RSA encryption keys in use today due to a mathematical technique that "has been hidden for about 2,500 years -- since Pythagoras." He went on to make clear that no cryogenics or special materials were used in the RSA-2048 key-cracking feat. BankInfoSecurity reached out to Gerck in search of some more detailed information about his claimed RSA-2048 breakthrough and in the hope of some evidence that what is claimed is possible and practical. Gerck shared an abstract of his upcoming paper. This appears to show that instead of using Shor's algorithm to crack the keys, a system based on quantum mechanics was used, and it can run on a smartphone or PC.

In some ways, it is good that the claimed breakthrough doesn't claim to use Shor's algorithm. Alan Woodward, a professor of computer science at the University of Surrey, told BankInfoSecurity that no quantum computer in existence has enough gates to implement Shor's algorithm and break RSA-2048. So at least this part of Gerck's explanation checks out. However, the abstract of Gerck's paper looks like it is "all theory proving various conjectures - and those proofs are definitely in question," according to Woodward. The BankInfoSecurity report on Gerck's "QC Algorithms: Faster Calculation of Prime Numbers" paper quotes other skeptics, most of whom are waiting for more information and proofs before they organize a standing ovation for Gerck.

An anonymous reader shares a report: Microsoft has had a rough few years of cybersecurity incidents. It found itself at the center of the SolarWinds attack nearly three years ago, one of the most sophisticated cybersecurity attacks we've ever seen. Then, 30,000 organizations' email servers were hacked in 2021 thanks to a Microsoft Exchange Server flaw. If that weren't enough already, Chinese hackers breached US government emails via a Microsoft cloud exploit earlier this year. Something had to give.

Microsoft is now announcing a huge cybersecurity effort, dubbed the Secure Future Initiative (SFI). This new approach is designed to change the way Microsoft designs, builds, tests, and operates its software and services today. It's the biggest change to security efforts inside Microsoft since the company announced its Security Development Lifecycle (SDL) in 2004 after Windows XP fell victim to a huge Blaster worm attack that knocked PCs offline in 2003. That push came just two years after co-founder Bill Gates had called on a trustworthy computing initiative in an internal memo.

Microsoft now plans to use automation and AI during software development to improve the security of its cloud services, cut the time it takes to fix cloud vulnerabilities, enable better security settings out of the box, and harden its infrastructure to protect against encryption keys falling into the wrong hands. In an internal memo to Microsoft's engineering teams today, the company's leadership has outlined its new cybersecurity approach. It comes just months after Microsoft was accused of "blatantly negligent" cybersecurity practices related to a major breach that targeted its Azure platform. Microsoft has faced mounting criticism of its handling of a variety of cybersecurity issues in recent years.

To explore America's "transition to a post-quantum world," the Washington Post interviewed U.S. federal official Nick Polk, who is focused on national security issues including quantum computing and is also a senior advisor to a White House federal chief information security officer): The Washington Post: The U.S. is in the early stages of a major shift focused on bolstering government network defenses, pushing federal agencies to adopt a new encryption standard known as post-quantum cryptography that aims to prevent systems from being vulnerable to advanced decryption techniques enabled by quantum computers in the near future...

Nick Polk: We've been using asymmetric encryption for a very long time now, and it's been ubiquitous since about 2014, when the U.S. government and some of the large tech companies decided that they're going to make it a default on most web browsers... Interestingly enough, regarding the post-quantum cryptographic standards being developed, the only thing that's quantum about them is that it has "quantum" in the name. It's really just a different type of math that's much more difficult for a quantum computer to be able to reverse-engineer. The National Institute of Standards and Technology is looking at different mathematical models to cover all their bases. The interesting thing is that these post-quantum standards are actually being used to protect classical computers that we have now, like laptops...

Given the breadth of the U.S. government and the amount of computing power we use, we really see ourselves and our role as a steward of the tech ecosystem. One of the things that came out of [this week's Inside Quantum Technology conference in New York City] was that we are very quickly moving along with the private sector to migrate to post-quantum cryptography. I think you're gonna see very shortly a lot of very sensitive private sector industries start to migrate or start to advertise that they're going to migrate. Banks are a perfect example. That means meeting with vendors regularly, and testing their algorithms to ensure that we can accurately and effectively implement them on federal systems...

The administration and national security memorandum set 2035 as our deadline as a government to migrate our [national security] systems to post-quantum cryptography. That's supposed to time with the development of operational quantum computers. We need to ensure that we start now, so that we don't end up not meeting the deadline before computers are operational... This is a prioritized migration for the U.S. government. We're going to start with our most critical systems — that includes what we call high-value assets, and high-impact systems. So for example, we're gonna prioritize systems that have personal health information.

That's our biggest emphasis — both when we talk to private industry and when we encourage agencies when they talk to their contractors and vendors — to really think about where your most sensitive data is and then prioritize those systems for migration.

Unciphered, a Seattle-based startup, claims to have cracked the seemingly unbreakable encryption of IronKey S200, a decade-old USB thumb drive. By exploiting an undisclosed vulnerability in the device, the company says it can bypass the drive's feature that erases its contents after 10 incorrect password attempts. The breakthrough came within a day of receiving a test device, suggesting that the firm's hacking technique, powered by high-performance computing, could have far-reaching implications.

The startup's focus is not just technological; it's after a specific IronKey that holds 7,002 bitcoins, valued at roughly $235 million, stored in a Swiss bank vault. The device belongs to Stefan Thomas, a Swiss crypto entrepreneur, who has forgotten the password and has only two password attempts left before losing access to his fortune. Unciphered believes its hacking capabilities could unlock Thomas' crypto vault and is preparing to reach out to him to offer its services. The only problem: Thomas doesn't seem to want their help. Wired: Earlier this month, not long after performing their USB-decrypting demonstration for me, Unciphered reached out to Thomas through a mutual associate who could vouch for the company's new IronKey-unlocking abilities and offer assistance. The call didn't even get as far as discussing Unciphered's commission or fee before Thomas politely declined. Thomas had already made a "handshake deal" with two other cracking teams a year earlier, he explained. In an effort to prevent the two teams from competing, he had offered each a portion of the proceeds if either one could unlock the drive. And he remains committed, even a year later, to giving those teams more time to work on the problem before he brings in anyone else -- even though neither of the teams has shown any sign of pulling off the decryption trick that Unciphered has already accomplished.

That has left Unciphered in a strange situation: It holds what is potentially one of the most valuable lockpicking tools in the cryptocurrency world, but with no lock to pick. "We cracked the IronKey," says Nick Fedoroff, Unciphered's director of operations. "Now we have to crack Stefan. This is turning out to be the hardest part." In an email to WIRED, Thomas confirmed that he had turned down Unciphered's offer to unlock his encrypted fortune. "I have already been working with a different set of experts on the recovery so I'm no longer free to negotiate with someone new," Thomas wrote. "It's possible that the current team could decide to subcontract Unciphered if they feel that's the best option. We'll have to wait and see." In past interviews, Thomas has said that his 7,002 bitcoins were left over from a payment he received for making a video titled "What is Bitcoin?" that published on YouTube in early 2011, when a bitcoin was worth less than a dollar. Later that year, he told WIRED that he'd inadvertently erased two backup copies of the wallet that held those thousands of coins, and then lost the piece of paper with the password to decrypt the third copy, stored on the IronKey. By then, his lost coins were worth close to $140,000.

"In 2023, the state of our digital privacy is: Very Creepy." That's the verdict from Mozilla's first-ever "Annual Consumer Creep-o-Meter," which attempts to set benchmarks for digital privacy and identify trends: Since 2017, Mozilla has published 15 editions of *Privacy Not Included, our consumer tech buyers guide. We've reviewed over 500 gadgets, apps, cars, and more, assessing their security features, what data they collect, and who they share that data with. In 2023, we compared our most recent findings with those of the past five years. It quickly became clear that products and companies are collecting more personal data than ever before — and then using that information in shady ways...

Products are getting more secure, but also a lot less private. More companies are meeting Mozilla's Minimum Security Standards like using encryption and providing automatic software updates. That's good news. But at the same time, companies are collecting and sharing users' personal data like never before. And that's bad news. Many companies now view their hardware or software as a means to an end: collecting that coveted personal data for targeted advertising and training AI. For example: The mental health app BetterHelp shares your data with advertisers, social media platforms, and sister companies. The Japanese car manufacturer Nissan collects a wide range of information, including sexual activity, health diagnosis data, and genetic information — but doesn't specify how.

An increasing number of products can't be used offline. In the past, the privacy conscious could always buy a connected device but turn off connectivity, making it "dumb." That's no longer an option in many cases. The number of connected devices that require apps and can't be used offline are increasing. This trend, coupled with the first, means it's harder and harder to keep your data private.
Privacy policies also need improvement. "Legalese, ambiguity, and policies that sprawl across multiple documents and URLs are the status quo. And it's getting worse, not better. Companies use these policies as a shield, not an actual resource for consumers." They note that Toyota has more than 10 privacy policy documents, and that it would actually take five hours to read all the privacy documents the Meta Quest Pro VR headset.

In the end they advise opting out of data collection when possible, enabling security features, and "If you're not comfortable with a product's privacy, don't buy it. And, speak up. Over the years, we've seen companies respond to consumer demand for privacy, like when Apple reformed app tracking and Zoom made end-to-end encryption a free feature."

You can also take a quiz that calculates your own privacy footprint (based on whether you're using consumer tech products like the Apple Watch, Nintendo Switch, Nook, or Telegram). Mozilla's privacy advocates award the highest marks to privacy-protecting products like Signal, Sonos' SL Speakers, and the Pocketbook eReader (an alternative to Amazon's Kindle. (Although 100% of the cars reviewed by Mozilla "failed to meet our privacy and security standards.")

The graphics on the site help make its point. As you move your mouse across the page, the cartoon eyes follow its movement...

An anonymous reader shares a Tom's Hardware report: Unfortunately, a default setting in Windows 11 Pro, having its software BitLocker encryption enabled, robs as much as 45 percent of the speed from your SSD as it forces your processor to encrypt and decrypt everything. According to our tests, random writes and reads -- which affect the overall performance of your PC -- get hurt the most, but even large sequential transfers are affected.

While many SSDs come with hardware-based encryption, which does all the processing directly on the drive, Windows 11 Pro force-enables the software version of BitLocker during installation, without providing a clear way to opt out. (You can circumvent this with tools like Rufus, if you want, though that's obviously not an official solution as it allows users to bypass the Microsoft's intent.) If you bought a prebuilt PC with Windows 11 Pro, there's a good chance software BitLocker is enabled on it right now. Windows 11 Home doesn't support BitLocker so you won't have encryption enabled there.

To find out just how much software BitLocker impacts performance, we ran a series of tests with three scenarios: unencrypted (no BitLocker), software BitLocker (the Windows 11 Pro default), and with hardware BitLocker (OPAL) enabled. While the software encryption increased latency and decreased transfer rates, hardware encryption and no encryption at all were basically tied. If you have software BitLocker enabled, you may want to change your settings.