As depressing as the privacy and security landscape gets around here, sometimes our European friends come out with laws that make us seem so much better by comparison.

While everyone knows child porn is a very bad thing, some people will use that to push big brother agendas that are way worse than the crime they try to prevent! But won't you please think of the children!?

Remember folks, perfect society is easily obtained! Just remove all privacy and freedom from EVERYONE and we'll easily be able to weed out the bad guys at any time. Sweet!

Liar, liar...

Would it surprise you to know that sugary cereals really aren't healthy? Sure! They have a vitamin or two and probably some kind of grain buried under all the fat and sugar and chemicals, but why pay attention to that?

Instead, Kellogg's corporation has been busy touting the healthy benefits of their kid's breakfast "foods":

Kellogg has agreed to expand a settlement order that was reached last year after the FTC alleged that the company made false claims that its Frosted Mini-Wheats cereal was “clinically shown to improve kids’ attentiveness by nearly 20%.”

At about the same time that Kellogg agreed to stop making these kinds of false claims in its cereal ads, the company began a new advertising campaign promoting the purported health benefits of Rice Krispies, according to the FTC. On product packaging, Kellogg claimed that Rice Krispies cereal “now helps support your child’s immunity,” with “25 percent Daily Value of Antioxidants and Nutrients – Vitamins A, B, C, and E.” The back of the cereal box stated that “Kellogg’s Rice Krispies has been improved to include antioxidants and nutrients that your family needs to help them stay healthy.”

What did they get for such a misleading and blatantly manipulative campaign? An order from the FTC to stop making claims without proper scientific backing. Ooooh! Burn!

Apparently Yahoo! is set to publicize everything you do online to all your friends. If you're not excited about this thrilling change, you can opt out with a single button click (so they say), but it doesn't say where or how.

I logged in with an old account and here's what you're looking for:

Once you click that, here's what you'll see:

It will nag you to keep the setting or you won't be able to share everything you do... boo hoo. Click it and party.

Click the checkbox and you should be good until the next major settings change they hope you don't notice.

Note that I clicked around a bit and eventually I did get a screen that warned me about the change and let me opt out. Even if you see that screen, it's not a bad idea to follow the directions I listed above just in case. Anyway, here's what the alert looked like:

Make sure to uncheck each box here the click "Get Started"

(Image used under: Fair Use doctrine)

While I don't support downloading music and movies instead of buying them, I also don't support abusing the legal system to bully people and make money. The RIAA has been doing just that for a long time according to several consumer groups.

In this case, the The American Civil Liberties Union - ACLU and the The Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF) are arguing that when the The RIAA - Who They Are In a Nutshell sues thousands of "infringers", they have to file thousands of separate lawsuits and not just one.

Filing one is cheaper and easier, but makes it harder and is unfair for the victims… er, I mean defendants.

If the court adopts the approach suggested here, the costs of the current anti-P2P litigation strategy could become untenable. If each anonymous defendant requires several hundred dollars in filing fees, individual paperwork, individual subpoenas, and detailed information on their alleged distribution, settling for a mere $1,500 doesn't sound so hot.

Let's hope for the best. Leave people alone and worry about pirating organizations and criminal groups instead.

Source: Ars Technica