Tag Archive for Lawsuit

| April 20, 2023
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How To Make Money on Facebook

Facebook has many dubious posts that promise you can make money one on Facebook. How you really can get easy money from Facebook. There is a $725 million class action lawsuit settlement with Facebook (META) (now Meta Platforms, Inc.) over allegations that it shared user data with third parties without consent. The settlement is part of the years-long litigation over Facebook’s relationship with Cambridge Analytica, which harvested the personal data of 87 million Facebook users.

Facebook–Cambridge Analytica scandal

For those with a short memory Cambridge Analytica was a British political consulting firm. It came to prominence through the Facebook–Cambridge Analytica data scandal. The scandal involved harvested Facebook data of 87 million people. The stolen data was used for advertising by the Trump campaign during the 2016 elections.

The Facebook–Cambridge Analytica data scandal was bad for several reasons. It exposed how Facebook allowed third parties to access and misuse the personal data of millions of users without their consent. It raised concerns about how such data could be used to influence elections and manipulate public opinion.

accused Facebook of violating their privacy rightsThis sparked a huge outcry from users, regulators, and lawmakers. They accused Facebook of violating their privacy rights and failing to protect their data from third-party abuse. Several lawsuits were filed against Facebook for this behavior. The suits later consolidated into one class action lawsuit representing all U.S. Facebook users who were affected by the data breach.

Facebook settles the lawsuit

After years of legal battles, Meta has finally agreed to settle the lawsuit for $725 million. This is the largest privacy class action settlement in U.S. history. According to the settlement agreement, Meta will pay each eligible user a certain amount of money based on how long they used Facebook during the period from May 2007 to December 2022.

Meta will pay each eligible userTo qualify for the settlement, you must have been a U.S. Facebook user between May 24, 2007 and December 22, 2022. You must submit a valid claim online or mail in a completed print form by August 25, 2023. The amount of money you can get depends on how long you had a Facebook account and how many total valid claims are submitted. As well as how much money is left after paying legal fees and expenses. You can choose to have your funds distributed by direct deposit, Venmo, Zelle, PayPal or via a prepaid Mastercard.

You can find more information on how to get your money on the official settlement website:

https://www.facebookuserprivacysettlement.com/

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This settlement is a huge win for Facebook users. Privacy advocate have been fighting for privacy rights and holding Meta accountable for its actions. It also sends a strong message to other tech companies that they need to respect their users’ data and be transparent about how they use it and who they share it with.

 

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Ralph Bach has been in IT long enough to know better and has blogged from his Bach Seat about IT, careers, and anything else that catches his attention since 2005. You can follow him on LinkedIn, Facebook, and Twitter. Email the Bach Seat here.

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| October 1, 2015
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HPE Been Busy

HPE Been BusyHP (HPQ) has been busy since it divorced itself and spawned HP Enterprise and HP Inc. There has been more enterprise activity in the past month than in the past years, as the spun-out HP Enterprise (HPE) side of the tech megalith tries to make a more relevant name for itself.

HPE layoffs

HP Enterprise logoFirst, Tim Stonesifer the CFO of the new HPE says that up to another 30,000 people will be laid off. The Business Insider reports these cuts will be focused on HP’s Enterprise Services Division, the consulting arm of the company.

During CEO Meg Whitman‘s tenure, HP has let go 85,000 workers with this latest round of layoffs. And they aren’t over yet claims CIO.com. Ms. Whitman and CFO Cathie Lesjak said that HP would lay off another 5% of staff.

Michigan lawsuit

State of Michigan is suing HPMore bad news as the State of Michigan announced it is suing HP. Michigan’s Secretary of State Ruth Johnson is charging HP with failing to deliver on a $49 million contract after 10 years, according to a press release from the state.

FierceCIO reports that the project was supposed to replace a legacy mainframe system that has run 131 Secretary of State offices. However, since 2005, and after $27.5 million was paid to the company, the state said that not a single promised function was delivered. In the press release she states:

 I inherited a stalled project when I came into office in 2011 and, despite our aggressive approach to hold HP accountable and ensure they delivered, they failed … We have no choice but to take HP to court to protect Michigan taxpayers.

MichiganThe state alleged that following a set of failed negotiations over the past few months, it rescinded its contract on Aug. 28 with a termination for cause letter. The article says the state argued, according to the terms of the contract, HP was supposed to provide support services for the state for some extended period of time. The state said that, instead, HP employees stopped reporting as of Aug. 31.

HP responded to a request for comment from FierceCIO with the following email statement: “It’s unfortunate that the state of Michigan chose to terminate the contract, but HP looks forward to a favorable resolution in court.”

HPE 3PAR

On the product side, HPE has updated the software that runs all of its HP 3PAR StoreServ Storage products to boost the performance of its SAN and other storage products an HP presser announced.

HP 3Par logoOne of the changes to the HP 3PAR Operating System. HP has added a new feature in the HP 3PAR Priority Optimization software. Fierce Enterprise Communications reports that the software now enables users to set specific latency goals as low as 0.5 milliseconds in the hopes of ensuring consistent performance levels in multi-tenant environments. The intention is to boost the quality of service for improved application performance.

VMware support

For data protection, HPE also added support for VMware (VMW) vSphere 6.0 with VMware Virtual Volumes to StoreOnce Recovery Manager Central for VMware. The update also includes more granular recovery of individual virtual machines and files, simplifying data recovery.

VMWareWith these changes, another Fierce Enterprise Communications article observes that HP is getting cozier in its relationship with VMware as the company unveiled new consulting and support services for VMware’s NSX SDN product.

There’s actually a laundry list of new aspects of the two companies’ partnership, according to the article. The partnership includes a variety of HP services and products that tie into different VMware software-defined data center and end-user computing products, but the networking aspect comes in the form of HP Network Virtualization Services.

Consulting The consulting and support services will be available starting in January 2016. According to an HP announcement at VMworld, the services were “designed to transform and operate the network when combining physical and virtual network resources, functionality and management to ready a network for virtualized cloud, network functions virtualization or SDI.”

HP plans to implement a novel idea by putting consulting and support services under the HP Network Virtualization Services umbrella to provide a 24/7/365 single place to connect with networking, virtualization, and NSX experts in the hopes of quickly resolving issues.

Security changes

HP Fortify logoOn the security front, HP announced new enterprise security tools that can detect communications between malware and a remote server as well as uncover bugs in enterprise software using machine learning.

The first called HP DNS Malware Analytics, uses an algorithm to detect enterprise machines infected with malware by analyzing Domain Name System traffic between the devices and remote servers according to a FierceCIO article. A one-year subscription to HP DMA starts at $80,000 to analyze up to 5 million DNS packets per day. Frank Mong, vice president of solutions at HP Security, claims, “This solves the problem of finding an infected host that has been missed by anti-virus and endpoint security”.

HP also introduced HP Fortify scan analytics, machine-learning technology, as part of HP Fortify on Demand, which uses an enterprise’s app security data to improve the accuracy and efficiency of app security. This technology integrates into existing app security testing workflows, increasing the efficiency of the app security audit process and the relevancy of findings, HP explained.

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Color me skeptical but I’m not sure that HP is the best horse for VMware to bet on in their battle with former partner Cisco (CSCO).

 

Ralph Bach has been in IT long enough to know better and has blogged from his Bach Seat about IT, careers, and anything else that catches his attention since 2005. You can follow him on LinkedIn, Facebook, and Twitter. Email the Bach Seat here.

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| August 7, 2012
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Anti-Patent Troll Bill Introduced

A newAnti-Patent Troll Bill Introduced bill introduced in the House of Representatives attempts to deter frivolous patent litigation. The bill would force unsuccessful patent plaintiffs to cover defendants’ legal costs according to Daily Wireless. Introduced by Rep. Peter DeFazio (D-OR) and co-sponsored by Rep. Jason Chaffetz (R-UT), the Saving High-Tech Innovators from Egregious Legal Disputes (SHIELD) Act is limited to patents related to computer hardware and software.

House of Representaive“Patent trolls don’t create new technology and they don’t create American jobs,” DeFazio said in a news release. “They pad their pockets by buying patents on products they didn’t create and then suing the innovators who did the hard work and created the product.”

The article explains that patent trolls often buy broad patents. The purchase allows them to file flimsy lawsuits against multiple companies for infringement. Despite very thin evidence to back their lawsuits, companies are often forced to settle. They settle because going to court can easily cost over $1 million in legal costs even if the company prevails, explained DeFazio in a press release.

Loser pays

Electronic Frontier FoundationThe Electronic Frontier Foundation explains the idea behind the SHIELD Act is simple. A plaintiff needs to believe that a defendant actually infringes a valid patent before it sues. If it doesn’t, then the plaintiff could be on the hook for the costs of litigation. They would also have to cover the winning party’s attorneys’ fees (which can cost hundreds of thousands of dollars in some cases).

Fee shifting, often called “loser pays,” is not a new idea. It’s long existed in copyright law, it allows a court to award the winning party costs and fees in certain cases. In patent litigation, the EFF says this type of provision would help tilt the playing field slightly more in favor of the good guys. Fee shifting would empower innovators to fight back while discouraging trolls from threatening lawsuits to start.

The EFF has set up a website defendinnovation.org to lead the battle against patent trolls and reform the U.S. Patent Office.

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Voter apathySigh – Today is primary election day here in the U.S. and I just got back from voting and a whopping 417 people in my neighborhood had voted. There are almost 17,000 people 18 years or old.

Voter apathy has everything to do with everything about where the US is today, including patent reform. Who are the politicians going to listen to?  I have covered the patent mess for a while here, here, here, and here. I doubt the political clout me and my 416 other neighborhood voters even matter when compared to the millions of dollars that Apple, Google, ATT, and the rest spend on lobbyists in Washington and Lansing to buy the legislation they want.

Have a nice day!

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Ralph Bach has been in IT long enough to know better and has blogged from his Bach Seat about IT, careers, and anything else that catches his attention since 2005. You can follow him on LinkedIn, Facebook, and Twitter. Email the Bach Seat here.

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| June 14, 2012
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Got Cyber Insurance?

Got Cyber Insurance?Network World says that standard business insurance does not cover data breaches or almost any other loss involving data. Standard insurance covers tangible losses and damage. Data isn’t tangible. This is causing many firms to investigate cyber insurance.

data is not tangibleThe decision that data is not tangible goes back to a 2000 ruling by a U.S. District Court. The ruling arose from an Arizona case, American Guarantee & Liability Insurance Co. vs. Ingram Micro Inc.. In that case, the court said that a computer outage caused by a power problem constituted physical damage within the meaning of the policy Ingram Micro (IM) had purchased from American Guarantee.

“After that, the insurance firms changed their policies to state that data is not considered tangible property,” Kevin Kalinich, national managing director for network risk at insurance vendor Aon Risk Solutions told Network World. The upshot is that an enterprise needs special cyber insurance to cover data-related issues. The problem is that the field is new and there is no such thing as standard coverage with a standard price.

Buyers push back

major source of push-back by potential buyersThe resulting complexity is a major source of push-back by potential buyers. According to Larry Ponemon, chairman of the Ponemon Institute, a research organization focused on information security and protection, “The policies have limitations and constraints similar to home policies with act-of-God provisions, and that has created a lot of uncertainty about what is covered, and what the risks are,” Mr. Ponemon told Network World. “Those who are nevertheless purchasing cyber insurance are typically very selective about what coverage they want,” he adds.

Cyber insurance coverages available

Data breach coverageData breach coverage: This pays for expenses that result from a data breach. Covered expenses typically include notification of the victims, setting up a call center. They also cover credit monitoring, and credit restoration services for the victims, and other crisis management services. Ken Goldstein, vice president at insurer Chubb Group told Network World. “You might want to hire forensic experts, independent attorneys for guidance concerning the multiple state (data breach notification) laws, and public relations experts,” he says.

Regulatory civil action coverage: Pays in cases where the insured is facing fines from a state attorney general after a data breach. It also covers fines from the federal government after a violation of the Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act (HIPAA) or similar regulations. Some policies only cover the cost of defending against the action. While others may pay the fine as well, says Steven Haase, head of INSUREtrust, an Atlanta-based specialty insurance provider.

Cyber extortion coverageCyber extortion coverage: For cases where a hacker steals data from the policyholder and then tries to sell it back, or someone plants a logic bomb in the policy holder’s system and demands payment to disable it. Among other things, the policy should cover the cost of a negotiator, and the cost of offering a reward leading to the arrest of the perpetrator, Goldstein says.

Virus liability: Pays in cases where the policyholder is sued by someone who claims to have gotten a virus from the policy holder’s system.

Content liability: Covers lawsuits filed by people angered over something posted on the Web site of the policyholder. Such coverage should also cover copyright claims and domain name disputes, Haase says.

Loss coverages

Lost income coverage: Replaces revenue lost while the policy holder’s computer system or Web site is down. But Kalinich notes that insurers often apply minimum downtimes of 12 or 24 hours, or require proof of actual losses. “They’ll say that, after all, the customers who did not get through (during the outage) could have come back later,” he says.

Loss of data coverageLoss of data coverage: Pays for the cost of replacing the policy holder’s data in case of loss. “Backup policies are not always effective, and accidents and sabotage happen,” Haase says.

Errors and omissions coverage: Otherwise known as O&M policies, this type of coverage predates cyber insurance, but is increasingly added to cyber policies to cover alleged failures by the policy holder’s software, Haase says.

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Seems that interest is growing in cyber insurance. I wrote about cyber insurance here.

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Ralph Bach has been in IT long enough to know better and has blogged from his Bach Seat about IT, careers, and anything else that catches his attention since 2005. You can follow him on LinkedIn, Facebook, and Twitter. Email the Bach Seat here.

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| September 1, 2011
Comments Off on Mobile Patent Warfare

Mobile Patent Warfare

Mobile Patent WarfareOne of the hobbies i have taken up is patent troll watching. Thanks to Flowing Data for pointing out work by Mike Bostock which visualizes the data of who is suing who in the mobile patent warfare battles. To see a live version of this data network go to the bl.ocks.org website here.

Moblie patent suits

Apple ComputersThe data on this chart indicates that Apple is at the heart of mobile patent warfare. Apple (AAPL) has been involved in 9 patent lawsuits. Other prodigious mobile patent litigators include Microsoft (MSFT) with 8 lawsuits, Kodak (KODK) with 7 suits, and newly created Google (GOOG)/Motorola union is involved in 5 mobile patent warfare skirmishes.

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Ralph Bach has been in IT long enough to know better and has blogged from his Bach Seat about IT, careers, and anything else that catches his attention since 2005. You can follow him on LinkedIn, Facebook, and Twitter. Email the Bach Seat here.

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