Category: Warning

The Tik Tok APP

Tik Tok is a social media app that gives users the opportunity to share 60 second short videos with friends, family or the entire world. The videos shared typically range from funny sketches to lip-sync videos featuring special effects to voices over extracts from films

The APP has more than 150 million active users and it is controversial because of the number of teenagers and children who use it.

The minimum age according to TikTok’s terms and conditions is 13, but Tik Tok does not verify a new user’s age except by asking for birth date.

When you download the app, you can instantly see the videos that others have posted on the channel but are not able to share or post anything until you have set up your own account. This is typical with social media.

The Problems

  • Some of the videosinclude bad language or subject matter unsuited for children. However, there is a setting to block inappropriate content
  • Because the site is used by children and includes videos, it may attract predatory adults

What should parents be concerned about?

You can set up an account on Tik Tpk by using your existing Google, Facebook or Instagram account.

By default all accounts are public so anyone on the app can see what your child shares. However, only approved followers can send them messages.

Users can like or react to a video, follow an account or send messages to each other. There is the risk that strangers will be able to directly contact children on the app.

Children may be tempted to take risks to get more of a following or likes on a video so it’s important to talk about what they share and with who.

You can set an account to be private so that all videos can only be seen by the creator and no one else on the platform. With a private account, you can approve or deny users and limit incoming messages to followers only.

Please note that even with a private account, your child’s profile photo, username, and bio are still visible to all users on the platform.

You can manage who can comment  and direct message your child on the APP

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Government Attacks Viagogo

Viagogo is a website that resells tickets for concerts, events, shows etc.

Viagogo has a bad reputation for hiding the true cost of the tickets and for not warning people that their tickets may not be valid (in many cases only the original purchaser can use the ticket) etc.

The Competition and Markets Authority (CMA) has issued court proceedings against Viagogo over concerns it is breaking consumer protection law.

Following an investigation into the secondary ticketing sector, the CMA began enforcement action against four major secondary ticketing websites in November 2018. As a result, three of those sites – StubHub, GETMEIN! and Seatwave – offered formal commitments in April 2019 to overhaul the way they do business.

However, Viagogo has not offered to make the changes the CMA considers necessary to bring it in line with the law. Legal proceedings have therefore been brought in the High Court.

Andrea Coscelli, CMA Chief Executive Officer, said that people who buy tickets on websites like Viagogo must be given all the information they are entitled to. It’s imperative they know key facts, including what seat they will get and whether there is a risk they might not actually get into the event.

This applies to Viagogo as much as it does to any other secondary ticketing website. Unfortunately, while other businesses have agreed to overhaul their sites to ensure they respect the law, Viagogo has not.

The CMA’s concerns include:-

  • Customer not being told if there is a risk that they will be turned away at the door
  • Customers are not being informed which seat in the venue they will get
  • Customers are not being told who is selling the ticket, which means that they can benefit from enhanced legal rights when buying from a business
  • Customers are given misleading information about the availability and popularity of tickets – which can lead to them being rushed into making a buying decision or making the wrong choice
  • Customers experience difficulties in getting their money back under Viagogo’s guarantee when things go wrong
  • Customers are being offered tickets that a seller does not own and may not be able to supply

Under the circumstances, it would seem foolhardy to trust Viagogo with your money.

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Massive Data Release on Internet

Collection #1 is a data set that was dumped onto the Internet. It contains 773 million email IDs and 21 million passwords and anybody can see the data.

Security researcher Troy Hunt runs the Have I Been Pwned website that lets people check if their email address has been in a data breach and he has analysed the data and uploaded it to his website haveibeenpwned.com so anyone can check if their details are included in this or any other high profile data breach. He does make the actual data available to anybody.

His analysis shows that Collection #1 is a set of email addresses and passwords totalling 2,692,818,238 rows. It’s made up of many different individual data breaches from literally thousands of different sources”

After cleaning the data and removing duplicates, it seems that 772,904,991 unique email addresses, along with 21,222,975 unique passwords are available in plain text. This does not include passwords that were found still in their hashed form.

Importantly, anyone who gets their hands on the cache can easily test the plain-text passwords against actual accounts. Approximately 140 million email accounts and some 10.6 million passwords were not known from past breaches.

If one or more of your accounts are in this data breach, then it is likely that one or more of your old passwords are available for others to see. Make sure you are not still using passwords from years ago.

Check if your accounts are included in the breach and if necessary change passwords and delete unnecessary accounts.

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GDPR Non Compliance

The General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) places legal requirements on organisations that use any personal data and send out marketing emails etc.

It is up to each organisation to ensure they comply with the regulations and there are nasty punishments for those who don’t.

However, some scammers have been finding new ways to get at businesses over GDPR.

For example, by sending emails and letters that threaten action unless your business registers with them.

(see blog post https://fightback.ninja/test/gdpr-non-compliance-scam/ )

Some scammers check business names against the public list of those that pay the Data Protection fees but others are too lazy to do that and just send the threatening emails to everyone on the spam lists they buy.

There are of course exemptions from paying the fees e.g. voluntary and charity organisations are often exempt depending on how they do their marketing.

If you’re exempt then don’t be taken in by threatening emails.

If you’re not sure if your business is exempt then refer to https://ico.org.uk

Don’t be conned.

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Data Sharing by APPS Out of Control

Oxford researchers looked at nearly one million APPS on Google Play Store and found that almost 90% of free APPS collect data and send it to Google, plus almost 40% collect data and send it to companies owned by Facebook.

Some of this is legitimate and necessary e.g. collecting and sending data on APP failures which helps the software maker to improve their product and Google Analytics data enables website owners to track their online usage via Google and so on.

But it does seem that a lot is to do with advertising.

The concept of free APPS is of course a tricky one as the APP makers have to make money somehow and passing data to potential advertisers is one way that many users won’t mind. But some of us do mind that our data is shared without our permission and this should not be allowed.

The sort of data collected can include age, gender, location, list of other installed APPS etc.

The research also found that 33% of the APPS send data to Twitter, 26% to Verizon (Yahoo, Tumblr etc.), 22% to Microsoft, 18% to Amazon etc.

These third-party trackers were mostly prevalent in news apps and apps aimed at children and young adults. By tracking user data – which includes information like age, location, gender, buying habits, and other miscellaneous information- companies can form a profile of users. This can then be used to send target specific ads, influence a user’s buying habits or even send political campaign messages.

Used in this manner, profiling of children without attempting to obtain parental consent, is illegal.

Do review the privacy settings on your APPS and delete any APPS you believe are sharing your data without your consent.

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