Privacy

Why Apple Spent $1 Million Lobbying the U.S. Government

October 26, 2014  ·  Mark Reback

<p>Apple may be one of the most valuable companies in the world, but in one area, it falls decidedly behind its rivals: its spending on lobbying the politicians of Washington.</p>

Corporate Giants Funding State Ballot Initiatives

October 23, 2014  ·  Mark Reback

<div class="story-body"> <p>WASHINGTON (AP) — Voters may not know it, but the millions of dollars paying for ads on ballot measures they will consider next month come from large companies and national advocacy groups.</p> <p>Many of the messages are tailored to defend or expand the business interests of companies such as Coca-Cola, Monsanto and ExxonMobil, yet few have their names in the ads.</p>

Google Spends More Than Any Other Tech Giant to Influence Congress

October 23, 2014  ·  Mark Reback

<p>Silicon Valley keeps playing the D.C. game. Tech and telecom giants including Google and Facebook spent millions on political lobbying in the three-month period from July to September, according to data released Tuesday.</p> <p>Google spent nearly $4 million on its efforts to win favor with lawmakers, up 17 percent over the same period last year (but down from roughly $5.3 million last quarter). Among major tech-related companies only Comcast spent more last quarter. The cable giant, of course, is trying to win approval for its $45 billion mega merger with Time Warner Cable.</p>

US Consumer Group Asks Google To Import Europe’s Right To Be Forgotten

October 17, 2014  ·  Mark Reback

<p>Consumer rights group Consumer Watchdog has asked Google to voluntarily offer Americans the same right Europeans' now have to ask for certain links to be removed from the results of searches about them.</p> <p>Weeks after wrapping up a European tour to discuss concerns over <a href="http://www.zdnet.com/google-loses-right-to-be-forgotten-fight-in-europes-top-court-7000029383/">the recent right to be forgotten ruling</a> from the EU's top court, Google chairman Eric Schmidt is facing calls from Consumer Watchdog to extend the same rights to Americans.</p>

BBC to Preserve Memory of Its ‘Forgotten’ Articles

October 17, 2014  ·  Mark Reback

<p class="story-body">The BBC will publish and continually update a list of its published articles that were removed from Google searches under Europe's "right to be forgotten" rule.</p>

Consumer Organization Asks Google To Extend “Right To Be Forgotten” To Americans

October 16, 2014  ·  Mark Reback

<p>Consumer advocates are pushing for America to become like Europe and introduce a “right to be forgotten” on the Internet.</p> <p>The Consumer Watchdog organization has <a href="http://www.consumerwatchdog.org/resources/ltrpagertbf101314.pdf" target="_blank" rel="noopener"><span style="color: #0000ff;">penned an open letter</span></a> to Google, asking it to extend the controversial EU ruling to the United States. If it gets its way, it would mean that American citizens could also ask Google to remove links pertaining to them from its search engine results.</p>

Right To Be Forgotten in the US: Americans Wanna Be Like EU-Oo-Oo, Says Watchdog

October 15, 2014  ·  Mark Reback

<p>The US should be more like Europe – and introduce the controversial "right to be forgotten" ruling – says a top American consumer-defending organisation.</p>

Covered California Awarded $184M in No-Bid Contracts, Data Show

October 14, 2014  ·  Mark Reback

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Prop 45 Seeks To Limit Health Insurance Price Hikes

October 14, 2014  ·  Mark Reback

<p>Tamara Kaplan loves to travel.</p> <p>Her home in University Heights is filled with tokens of her many trips. She brought some distinctive figurines back from one her recent sojourns.</p>

Consumer Watchdog Tasks Google with Extending ‘Right To Be Forgotten’ to the US

October 14, 2014  ·  Mark Reback

<p>There are a lot of things that we wish we could forget and probably even more things that we want everyone else to forget. The Internet and social media has made that pretty much all but impossible. If you don’t believe me, just ask any politician. So much information is being gathered about you every time you visit a site. This is mostly for advertising reasons, but unfortunately, it can be used for almost anything.</p>

Americans Support “Right To Be Forgotten,” Software Advice’s Survey Finds

October 10, 2014  ·  John M. Simpson

<p><img class=" alignright size-full wp-image-2801" alt="" src="https://consumerwatchdog.org/wp-content/uploads/2014/10/images_online-privacy-920724_0.jpg" style="width: 300px; height: 200px; float: right;" width="449" height="299" />Since <a href="http://europa.eu/about-eu/institutions-bodies/court-justice/index_en.htm">The European Court of Justice</a> ruled  that citizens of the European Union have a “right to be be forgotten” Google and other search engine operators have been doing their best to undermine the court’s decision.  Instead — if they would actually listen to their users — they would be figuring out how to implement the right in the United S

The 5 Rules On How To Kill A Consumer-Friendly Initiative

October 10, 2014  ·  Mark Reback

<p style="font-size: 18px; line-height: normal; font-family: Georgia; color: rgb(102, 102, 102);"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px">California's initiative process can shine a bright light on how money and influence work their magic in American politics.</span></p>