With deepfake voice fraud an increasing threat, new research shows that 30 percent of Americans are not confident they would be able to detect the difference between a computer generated voice and a human one.

The study from ID R&D, a provider of AI-based biometrics and voice and face anti-spoofing technologies, shows only just over a third (36 percent) are confident they could spot a fake.

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Financial services business tend to be attacked more than those in any other sector, but a new study finds that 75 percent of respondents in this industry are over confident in their data management practices.

A worrying 24 percent of respondents to Integris Software's 2019 FinServ Data Privacy Maturity Study only update their personal data inventory once a year. Even more concerning, 13 percent only inventory sensitive data when audited or in response to regulation requests.

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In the retail sector particularly the line between online and offline worlds is increasingly blurred. But how can businesses protect their customer data effectively in this world?

We spoke to, Gary Barnett, CEO of secure payment systems specialist Semafone to discuss this, the effect of the upcoming CCPA legislation and more.

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According to a new report, more than 60 percent of all leaked records in 2019 were exposed by financial services organizations, despite only six percent of breaches affecting these organizations.

The 2019 Financial Breach Report from Bitglass says these figures are at least partially due to the Capital One breach, which compromised more than 100 million records.

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New account fraud -- attempts by an individual to create a new online account by manipulating a government-issued ID -- is up 28 percent this year according to a new report.

Data from trusted identity provider Jumio shows this type of fraud has increased over 100 percent on 2014 levels.

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With the California Consumer Privacy Act (CCPA) coming into force in January and GDPR in Europe having been active for nearly two years, data privacy is something that's being taken more seriously than ever.

But what impact does legislation have on businesses and consumers? And how has GDPR influenced the drafting of CCPA? To find out we spoke to Sophie Stalla-Bourdillon, senior privacy counsel and legal engineer and Dan Wu, privacy counsel and legal engineer, from data governance specialist Immuta.

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As fear mounts in the UK at the prospect of the NHS being sold in part or in whole to the US, the government has decided to give Amazon access to National Health Service data for free.

The arrangement means that Amazon will be able to access "healthcare information, including ... symptoms, causes, and definitions". The tech giant will be able to use the data in conjunction with Alexa to enable users to get medical help and advice via the digital assistant.

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It recently came to light that even with Location Services disabled, iPhone 11 Pro handsets appeared to be checking for location data, sparking concerns about privacy.

Having initially dismissed this as "expected behavior", Apple has now gone into more detail about what's actually happening. Rather than being a sinister case of tracking iPhone users, the company says that location checks are actually required because of the ultra wideband chips found in newer iPhones.

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Security researcher Brian Krebs has discovered a peculiarity with the iPhone 11 Pro and its collection of location data.

In what is described as a "possible privacy bug", Krebs found that the iPhone 11 Pro seeks location data even when system services and apps are configured to never request this information -- the location arrow icon can be seen popping into view at unexpected times. Curiously, despite seemingly contradicting its privacy policies, Apple says that it is by design.

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When it comes to the extensive and invasive use of biometric data, the USA is one of the worst offenders in the world, faring only slightly better than China.

According to research conducted by Comparitech, which rated 50 countries according to how, where and why biometrics were taken and how they are stored, the US ranked as the fourth worst country. Topping the list is China, followed by Malaysia and Pakistan.

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It is not just Google which is coming under the scrutiny of the European Commission – the European antitrust regulator have announced that they are also looking into the data collection practices of Facebook.

Just as with Google, the Commission has sent out preliminary questionnaires as part of an investigation into how Facebook collects and monetizes its data.

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Conceding that as a company it "is not perfect at privacy and data protection", Twitter has revealed details of a new Privacy Center. This central repository will serve as the portal through which Twitter will keep users informed about how it handles user data.

Twitter is also introducing updates to its privacy policy on January 1, 2020. These will be compliant with the California Consumer Privacy Act (CCPA) which places numerous obligations on large companies, including giving customer greater control and transparency, and the right to have their data deleted on request.

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Embracing the notion of data portability, Facebook has launched a new tool that lets users transfer their photos and videos from Facebook to other online services.

The social network is kicking things off by making it possible to transfer data from Facebook to Google Photos. It comes as part of Facebook's participation in the open-source Data Transfer Project and the ability to transfer to other services will be added soon.

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A huge database of text messages and user data has been discovered online, completely unprotected and free for anyone to browse.

Found by researchers from vpnMentor, the database belongs to US communications company, TrueDialog. Among the exposed data are not only tens of millions of SMS messages, but also private information including usernames and passwords.

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The European Commission has started an investigation into "practices relating to Google's collection and use of data".

EU antirust regulators have already hit Google with record-breaking fines, but concern remains about how the company collects data about its users as well as how this data is then used. The regulator has contacted several companies to ask about agreements they have with Google to hand over user data and what -- if any -- money was involved.

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