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Privacy Tech-Know blog: Privacy Enhancing Technologies for Businesses

Privacy Tech-Know blog: Videoconferencing – Maintain your physical distance, but keep your personal information close

As Canadians continue to adapt to social distancing, many of us have turned to videoconferencing services to help keep in touch with loved ones, connect with our colleagues, maintain our fitness routines, host social events, and complete our educational activities.

The SIM card swap scam: What it is and what you can do to minimize risk

Smart phones offer many benefits, including convenience and easier communication. Many people feel they can’t live without them, and use their devices for banking, shopping, paying bills, account verification and to access social media.

Privacy Tech-Know blog: Thinking like a machine – The basics of artificial intelligence

Humans have long been captivated by the idea of machines that mimic natural life. Examples of automata – mechanical devices that move as if by their own power – date back centuries, through the middle ages and into Ancient Greece. Of course, any semblance of “intelligence” in these machines was an illusion; they were designed by their creators to do specific tasks and move in particular ways, though at times these could be quite elaborate.

Privacy Tech-Know Blog: Secret Agent 102 – Public-Key Cryptography

In a previous blog post we introduced the topic of cryptography, which is a key tool for keeping information secure and private. We used the example of a relatively simple symmetric encryption scheme where the encryption and decryption keys are the same.

Privacy tips for spring cleaning

The days are getting longer, winter is drawing to a close, and it’s beginning to feel like spring. As you make your spring cleaning “to-do” list, have you given any thought to how you could better protect your privacy?

Privacy Tech-Know Blog: Secret Agent 101— Basics of Cryptography

Individuals and organizations have long had a need to protect secrets from prying eyes. One way in which we protect those secrets is through the use of cryptography, from the Greek kryptós, meaning "hidden” or “secret" and graphein, meaning "writing".  Early forms of cryptography were used by the ancient Egyptians, Greeks and Romans.

Privacy Tech-Know Blog: Seeing A Different World: The Possibilities Associated with Augmented and Virtual Reality

Phones, glasses, and headsets can now all either overlay information on the world we’re looking at or immerse us entirely in imaginary ones. The processes of overlaying information, termed ‘augmented reality’, can be seen when Pokémon appear on our mobile phones, directions appear for nearby restaurants, or our food’s nutritional information is displayed when we point our camera at our plate.

Privacy Tech-Know Blog: Cookieless Identification and Tracking of Devices

We are regularly told to block or ‘clear our cookies’, or use a private browsing mode, if we don’t want to be tracked as we visit websites. Website operators and marketing, advertising, and other tracking companies, however, have developed other ways of tracking us, called ‘fingerprinting’, which work even if you clear or block your cookies. How prevalent is this kind of cookieless tracking? How accurate is it? And what are the implications for our ability to control our personal information and protect our privacy interests?