John Cox

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apple.news

I tried everything to get better sleep. These five items actually helped — Guardian US

A journalist with chronic sleep issues and sound/light sensitivity reviews tech tools she's actually used to improve her sleep, ranging from a $20 pair of Loop earplugs to a $349 Elemind headband that uses brain-wave stimulation. She finds that while some devices are genuine snake oil, several genuinely help—particularly the Elemind for fall-asleep assistance and travel, noise-canceling earbuds for blocking disruptive sounds, and a bone-conduction pillow speaker that doesn't require in-ear wear. The piece emphasizes that these tools work best when you're genuinely trying to sleep rather than as magical fixes, and offers budget-friendly alternatives alongside premium options.

Permalink healthwellnesssleepprivacy

eternitymodern.com

accounts.google.com

syncthing.net

Syncthing

Syncthing is a decentralized file synchronization tool that allows real-time sharing of files between multiple computers without storing data on central servers, using end-to-end encryption and cryptographic authentication to ensure only authorized devices can access synchronized folders. The software works across major operating systems and requires minimal configuration, automatically handling network details like UPnP port forwarding while allowing users to maintain complete control over their data and sharing permissions.

Permalink privacysecuritytoolsopensource

Macworld

How the NSA snoop-proofs its Macs | Macworld

This article updates the NSA's 2010 Mac security recommendations for OS X Mountain Lion, translating agency guidance into practical steps for average users while candidly noting which measures would severely degrade usability. The author covers account security, automatic updates, firewall configuration, encryption via FileVault, and various system-level hardening techniques, assessing the real-world cost of each precaution so readers can decide which trade-offs between security and convenience suit their needs.

Permalink privacysecuritymacos

maildrop.cc

MailDrop

Maildrop is a free service that generates temporary, disposable email addresses you can use instead of your real one when signing up for websites, apps, or services. You create any address without registration, receive emails sent to it within seconds, and the sender never gets your actual email—protecting your privacy from marketers, data breaches, or spam. The service includes spam filtering powered by Heluna's technology and offers a developer API for automated testing.

Permalink privacysecuritydevelopmenttools

www.nytimes.com

303 See Other

The U.S. Postal Service operates two surveillance programs—the century-old "mail covers" system and the more recent Mail Isolation Control and Tracking program—that collectively monitor the exterior information of virtually all mail processed in the country, creating a comprehensive map of Americans' communications without requiring judicial warrants. Law enforcement agencies request mail covers tens of thousands of times annually for criminal and counterterrorism investigations, citing their effectiveness in solving crimes, but critics argue the programs are easily abused and amount to the same invasive surveillance as the NSA's electronic monitoring, yet Congress has not revisited the issue since brief hearings in 1976. A Buffalo bookstore owner and former environmental activist discovered he was under postal surveillance and has now sued the government, exemplifying concerns that the system enables tracking of political dissidents without proper oversight.

Permalink privacysecuritynewssurveillance

Salon.com

Online advertising’s racism mess - Salon.com

Harvard privacy researcher Latanya Sweeney found that Google's AdSense algorithm was showing arrest-record ads 25 percent more frequently when searching for names perceived as Black (like Latanya or Rasheed) compared to white-sounding names. The algorithm wasn't programmed to discriminate; rather, it was mechanically learning from aggregate user behavior—racist employers clicking arrest ads more often for Black-identified names taught the system to associate those names with criminal records. This research illustrates how automated systems can amplify and perpetuate societal racism without any intentional bias in the code itself.

Permalink aiprivacyadvertising

blog.jcoglan.com

Announcing Vault: safer passwords for the web - The If Works

Vault is a storage-free password generator that creates different, random-looking passwords for each service by hashing a master passphrase together with the service name, eliminating the need to store or sync passwords across devices. Unlike traditional password managers that require installation and secure storage, Vault exists as a static webpage or command-line tool accessible anywhere, solving the adoption and portability problems that plague existing solutions while maintaining strong security through high-entropy output that prevents attackers from predicting other passwords even if they obtain one.

Permalink privacysecurityopensource

chetansurpur.com

Sidestep

Sidestep is a Mac application that automatically detects when you connect to unprotected wireless networks and encrypts your traffic by tunneling it through a secure proxy server of your choice, protecting you from session hijacking attacks like those enabled by Firesheep. The tool requires minimal setup—you configure it once with proxy server details, and it then runs silently in the background, only activating on open networks while leaving secure WPA connections alone. Users can establish their proxy through existing servers, home computers, Amazon EC2 instances, or donation-supported services, with optional passwordless authentication via RSA keys.

Permalink privacysecuritymacvpn

Gizmodo

The Case Against Google

Google has abandoned its core mission of serving users to become a company obsessed with collecting comprehensive personal data across all platforms, driven by the need to answer subjective real-world questions that require intimate knowledge of users' preferences, locations, relationships, and habits. The company is deliberately degrading its search product, pushing users toward Google+ through misleading practices, and violating user trust through undisclosed tracking and preferential promotion of its own inferior services—violations that contradict its own stated definition of evil. Unless Google reverses course and returns to honest product-building focused on user interests rather than data extraction for commercial purposes, the initial case for trusting it with personal information is evaporating.

Permalink technologyprivacybusinessgoogle

EZOS.Hosting

Boing Boing

Salon.com

WH forces P.J. Crowley to resign for condemning abuse of Manning - WikiLeaks - Salon.com

State Department spokesman P.J. Crowley was forced to resign after publicly criticizing the military's detention conditions for Bradley Manning—specifically calling them "ridiculous, counterproductive and stupid"—prompting Obama to defend Manning's treatment at a press conference. The incident exemplifies what the author sees as a glaring double standard in the Obama administration: those responsible for torture and illegal surveillance face no consequences, whistleblowers are prosecuted aggressively, yet a government official is fired simply for speaking out against abuse of a detainee. Greenwald draws a sharp contrast with Democrats' past criticism of the Bush administration for crushing internal dissent, arguing that Obama's intolerance for Crowley's candid remarks contradicts his campaign promises to welcome challenging voices and form a "team of rivals."

Permalink privacypoliticsnewsri-freaking-dick-ulas

Salon.com

WH forces P.J. Crowley to resign for condemning abuse of Manning - Glenn Greenwald - Salon.com

Glenn Greenwald critiques Michael Crowley's argument that McCain/Palin rally vitriol is not uniquely alarming because Democrats similarly attacked George Bush in 2004, arguing that Crowley falsely equates the two without regard to factual merit. Greenwald contends that Bush's administration demonstrably committed war crimes—including torture at Abu Ghraib and an unprovoked invasion of Iraq—making accusations against him substantively different from baseless attacks on Obama as a terrorist and Arab traitor. Greenwald identifies this reflexive assertion of false equivalencies as emblematic of modern Beltway journalism's corruption: the pursuit of appearing "balanced" and gaining establishment approval has replaced the journalist's fundamental obligation to truth and accuracy.

Permalink privacypoliticsnewsri-freaking-dick-ulas

Lifehacker

Mozy Drops Unlimited Backups, Introduces New Pricing

Mozy eliminated its unlimited backup plan in favor of tiered pricing (50GB for $6/month or 125GB for $9.99/month, with additional storage at $2 per 20GB), dramatically raising costs for existing users—the author's own backup needs of 226GB would jump from $5/month to $20/month. The piece questions whether this industry shift toward metered plans makes sense given that storage costs actually decrease annually, and suggests readers explore alternatives like Carbonite that still offer unlimited plans.

Permalink productivityprivacypersonal financereviews

pinboard.in

Pinboard - antisocial bookmarking

Pinboard is a paid, ad-free bookmarking service designed for privacy-conscious users who want a simple, fast way to save and organize links without tracking or surveillance. The platform integrates with browsers and services like Twitter and Instapaper, and offers optional archiving that creates full-text searchable backups of saved content and monitors for broken links.

Permalink productivityorganizationprivacytools

www.economist.com