Consumer Tips: How one single school opt out can greatly improve your kids’ privacy

Q: Why is my kid’s email and home address being sold on a marketing list? I didn’t give permission for this information to be released! How did this happen?  This kind of sharing could happen unless you proactively opt out of allowing schools to share the information they keep on your kids such as their

Consumer Alert — Home Depot data breach info: how to sign up for free credit monitoring

If you have purchased items with a credit or debit card at the Home Depot from April 2014 onward, your credit and debit cards have been subject to a security breach. Home Depot is offering one year of free credit monitoring through All Clear ID Pro. Because there is already known fraud stemming from this breach, WPF encourages breach victims to sign up for the free credit monitoring. Here’s how to sign up ….

Public Comments: WPF files comments on proposed national identity standard, recommends changes

The World Privacy Forum filed technical comments on the IDPV National Standard Project today, offering key privacy recommendations on the proposed standard, Requirements and Implementation Guidelines for Assertion, Resolution, Evidence, and Verification of Personal Identity, version 5.3.1. WPF analyzed the proposed standard carefully, and sees the need for several changes to the standard to improve consumer privacy. In our comments, the intent is to help create a standard that increases security, trustworthiness of identities, and identity credentials while protecting individual privacy.

Consumer Tips – Facebook Privacy Guide: Finding and using Privacy Shortcuts

Facebook has a “privacy shortcut” menu that gives you quick access to key privacy settings. You may have missed this feature, because it is behind an icon, and not everyone clicks through every icon. It’s worth finding the Privacy Shortcuts, though, because you can quickly check the privacy of your status posts, view how your page looks to the public, see what you’re tagged in, block users, and other things. Here are some tips on where you can find the privacy shortcuts on desktop and mobile.

FTC announces final agenda and panelist roster for Big Data workshop

The Federal Trade Commission has announced its panelist roster and final agenda for its upcoming workshop, “Big Data: A Tool for Inclusion or Exclusion?.”  The workshop is going to be an important and thoughtful discussion about big data and privacy issues, and will be taking place on Sept. 15 in Washington, D.C.  The World Privacy