Month: December 2019

The non-profit digital rights group Electronic Frontier Foundation recently released a new study showing that many popular sites share the user data they collect with third-party businesses, including data brokers, advertisers, and government bodies.

Uber is planning to flout a different California law that would reclassify its army of drivers from contractors to employees, potentially entitling them to benefits and perks. The ridesharing company is joining forces with Lyft and Doordash to mount a $90 million counteroffensive against the new law, which also takes effect January.

Lawyers for Uber are arguing that the law doesn’t apply to the company because drivers’ work falls  “outside the usual course of Uber’s business,” which they define as providing a technology platform.

The so-called “gig worker” law, formerly known as AB5, has already impacted Vox Media, which recently laid off hundreds of freelance journalists who would have been reclassified as employees under the new law.

While companies can challenge these California laws, Margita Thompson, who served as press secretary for former Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger, told Capital Public Radio that the courts may end up enforcing them.

In the end, she said, “it’s not gonna be something that companies can ignore.”

Follow David Ng on Twitter @HeyItsDavidNg. Have a tip? Contact me at dng@breitbart.com

The Post used a 2017 Chevy Volt for its experiment and learned that the car collected a wide range of highly precise data ranging from the vehicles location to information about the driver’s cell phone, including call records — noting that many vehicles copy over personal data the moment that a smart phone is plugged into the vehicle.

The Post noted that the Chevy Volt did not inform drivers what information it was recording and did not make mention of it in the owner’s manual since there are no federal regulations protecting consumer’s privacy and data from automakers.

First, Mason hacked into the car’s infotainment center, as it was the easiest computer to use to gain physical access inside the vehicle. The experiment yielded interesting results once the computer was removed and connected to his laptop, Fowler wrote.

He continued:

It was worth the trouble when Mason showed me my data. There on a map was the precise location where I’d driven to take apart the Chevy. There were my other destinations, like the hardware store I’d stopped at to buy some tape. Among the trove of data points were unique identifiers for my and Doug’s phones, and a detailed log of phone calls from the previous week. There was a long list of contacts, right down to people’s address, emails and even photos.

“As information privacy becomes increasingly scarce in the world of social media, even car companies have begun collecting massive amounts of data on their drivers,” wrote Breitbart News’s Lucas Nolan in January 2018.

“According to ABI research, there are currently 78 million cars on the road with an embedded cyber connection feature. Research firm Gartner expects that by 2021, 98 percent of cars sold in the U.S. and Europe will be data connected,” he stated.

In his recent column, Fowler urged potential car buyers to ask their dealership about the vehicle’s connected services and if it is possible to turn them off.

“Few offer an Internet ‘kill switch,’ but they may at least allow you turn off location tracking,” he concluded.

CNBC noted that the global trade outlook was in a state of turmoil with the election of Donald Trump and with the Brexit proposal in the United Kingdom, but it became more clear as time progressed.

The House of Representatives passed the Trump administration’s U.S.-Mexico-Canada Trade Agreement (USMCA), and the U.S. appeared to start the process of making a trade deal with China.

In the United Kingdom, Boris Johnson won the election for the Conservatives, and he is expected to have enough power to negotiate his country’s exit from the European Union.

The surge in world markets has largely been because of the dominating force of U.S. markets. The Dow Jones Industrial Average, the S&P 500, and the Russell 2000 all rose by more than 20 percent this year.

Individual stocks such as Apple and Facebook also made significant gains, with Apple rising by 80 percent and Facebook rising by 57 percent.

He continued, “The numbers since Thanksgiving have been unbelievable. Despite all the fear-mongering that happened early on in the year from the Democrats frankly about really talking the economy into recession, consumers knew better. They saw the now hiring signs and knew jobs were up and paychecks up because of wage growth and tax cuts. They were feeling great.”

He added, “Average disposable income for the average household up $6,000 and the doubling of the child tax credit, the elimination of the 15% rate. Those two things combined alone are huge booms for the consumer. That’s why I do believe — remember, 70% of this economy is consumer-driven and why the fear-mongering the Democrats were trying to do to throttle back the economy, which is really unpatriotic from my perspective failed on them.”

Follow Pam Key on Twitter @pamkeyNEN

Officials report the Honduran man received a conviction from a court in New York City relating to sexual abuse of a minor. The records indicated that the court convicted the man of an act in a manner to injure a child under the age of 17. The court sentenced him to 364 days in jail. He was subsequently removed from the U.S.

Tucson Sector Border Patrol agents assigned to the State Route 83 immigration checkpoint near the Arizona town of Sonoita arrested a Mexican man they determined to be illegally present in the U.S., officials stated.

During a biometric investigation, agents identified the man as 38-year-old Gustavo Gonzalez-Rodriguez. Court records revealed a conviction in California in 2001 for lewd and lascivious acts with a child under the age of 14, officials stated. The court required the Mexican man to register as a sex offender.

His extensive criminal history also included a 2016 conviction in a South Carolina court for assault and battery. He received a 10-year sentence for that crime. At some point following the sentencing, immigration officers removed him to Mexico.

Both previously deported felons could face prosecution for aggravated re-entry after removal as a sex offender. If convicted on the charges, the previously deported criminal aliens could face up to 20 years each in federal prison.

Najour posted the story on her Facebook page and asked social media users for their help in paying off Tucker’s bill.

The post read:

She is unable to pay the $800 it costs to repair her car. So I’m asking Facebook for help. If I could have 800 people which I know I have over that many on my Facebook, can 800 people send me $1 so we can get this woman’s car fixed. It broke my heart watching her clean her car out knowing she wouldn’t be leaving with it. Just trying to do something nice & help someone out who desperately needs it.

Two hours after posting the request, Najour’s helpers had raised a little over $1,000. She also used her employee discount to have Tucker’s repair bill cut in half, according to WFTV.

Tucker and her four children recently lost their home in a fire and were living in a hotel before moving to Newnan. She commutes to her job in LaGrange every day, so her car is an essential part of how she provides for her kids.

Friday, Najour gave Tucker the good news and presented her with $500 of the remaining funds.

“I don’t know anybody here so it was nobody but God and it was a blessing and I really do appreciate that,” Tucker said of the generous gift.

“I knew God put me there for a reason,” Najour concluded.

Andrew gave away his Kyrie Irving autographed basketball sneakers to one of the children.

Brandon Brundidge gave away the Uno card game he received for Christmas even though he was “so excited to play it.”

Fire crews were on the scene putting out hot spots on Wednesday, with the cause of the fire still under investigation. As of Thursday, fire crews remained at the scene extinguishing what was left of the blaze after spending all of Wednesday battling it, the Minneapolis Fire Department tweeted.

Crews remain on scene at the Drake Hotel Fire. Crews have battled the fire throughout the night making significant progress. Crews are now working with a single master stream to extinguish the remaining fire with the goal of wrapping up suppression activities this afternoon.

— Minneapolis Fire (@MinneapolisFire) December 26, 2019

The building, called the Drake Hotel, serves as a temporary shelter for the homeless and an overflow homeless shelter when other homeless shelters in the city are full, the Star Tribune reported. It was built in 1926 and has 146 rooms.