Your daily round-up of some of the other stories in the news
Uber accused of tracking Lyft drivers
Uber is facing another lawsuit, this time from a former Lyft driver alleging that the rival taxi app company used used a program called “Hell” to track him and other Lyft drivers.
Michael Gonzalez’s suit, filed in California, alleges that Uber invaded the privacy of Lyft drivers, violated California’s Invasion of Privacy act and the Federal Wiretap act, and engaged in unfair competition.
The suit claims that Uber developed the “Hell” software to “access the location of up to eight Lyft drivers at one time and obtain their unique Lyft ID” with the aim of identifying drivers who worked for both companies and lure the Lyft drivers away to work for Uber.
The lawsuit comes as it was revealed Uber’s chief executive, Travis Kalanick, had been summoned to Apple’s headquarters and told off by CEO Tim Cook for “fingerprinting” users’ iPhones.
UK and European countries could be hit by US laptop ban
Travellers from some European countries, including the UK, to the US could face the same ban on taking devices bigger than a smartphone into an aircraft cabin, according to reports.
President Donald Trump’s administration last month ordered some airlines from nine countries to carry any electronic device larger than a smartphone in the hold of the aircraft rather than in cabin bags, sparking dismay among regular travellers at being parted from their laptops, Kindles and tablets.
The Guardian reported that US officials are considering extending the ban to flights from Europe, and that the US is considering including the UK in the extended list of countries.
The UK also imposed a similar ban at the same time, affecting some airlines flying in from six countries. On Monday, New Zealand was reported to be considering a similar ban, saying it was “assessing the evidence to determine what is appropriate”.
Fancy Bear ‘tried to hack Macron and Merkel’
The Russian hacking group known as Fancy Bear is at it again, allegedly, this time apparently launching phishing attacks against Emmanuel Macron’s campaign for the French presidency.
Researchers said they had found evidence that the group, also known as APT28, set up sophisticated phishing schemes designed to steal passwords from Macron’s campaign as well as German chancellor Angela Merkel’s CDU party.
Fancy Bear is the group thought to be behind the hacking attacks on the Democratic National Congress last year that resulted in Wikileaks dumping DNC chairman John Podesta’s emails online, damaging the Democrat candidate Hillary Clinton and possibly fatally wounding her presidential campaign.
Catch up with all of today’s stories on Naked Security
Wilderness
Uber sounds like it’s run by very unsavory managers.
TonyG
Considering that some airline, such as Brussels Airlines, insist on taking cabin bags on small aircraft and then handled them so roughly that they broke my wife’s laptop, a laptop ban is going to cause huge disruption. This is because the airline then claimed it was checked baggage (not true) and so they are not responsible for any damage to fragile items such as laptops.
There is a way round – use WTG (Windows to Go) and PCs/laptops at the other end. Or maybe it will revive Windows based phones that you can then plug into a monitor (or hotel TV) and keyboard.