This is too funny, scary and prescient:

Undressing the naked truth about the future of airline travel

Cavity searches, complementary catheters, cryogenic suspension will be the norms

By Paula Simons, Edmonton Journal

January 7, 2010 2:07 AM

The Edmonton Journal

January 7, 2011

The federal government says Canadian air travellers will soon be asked to undergo full-body cavity searches.

The move comes after full-body scanners, of the same type installed in Canadian airports last year, failed to detect bomb-making materials that a group of alleged would-be bombers had secreted within their personal body cavities.

Transport Canada says passenger privacy will be fully protected, because all individuals being stripped-searched will wear paper bags over their heads, preventing security officers from seeing their faces.

"We feel this strikes the necessary balance between protecting passenger safety and avoiding unnecessary traveller embarrassment," said Transport Canada spokesman Winston Smith.

Health Canada will compensate travellers by including complementary prostate exams and PAP smears as part of the inspection process.

"We won't just be striking a blow in the war on terror," said Reductio Ad-Absurdum, a spokesman with the Prime Minister's office. "We'll also reduce the burden on our public health-care system by screening early for cervical and prostate cancer. We think Canadians will be open to the value-added benefits."

While a few civil libertarian academic-types raised concerns about the invasion of privacy, most of those commenting on The Journal's web-site were enthusiastic.

"Flying is a privilege, not a right," said one.

"If you don't have anything to hide, why would you object?"

"The world is a scary place," said another. "I don't mind having my government stick its nose into every nook and cranny."

The Edmonton Airport Authority is asking all local passengers to arrive at the airport at least five hours before flight time to allow enough time for the new inspections.

---

The Edmonton Journal

January 7, 2015

In a new policy initiative designed to flush out terrorist plots, Transport Canada has announced that airline passengers will no longer be allowed to use on-board washrooms while the plane is in flight.

"Letting people move freely through the cabin, allowing them access to a private space where they couldn't be monitored, well, it's just too big a risk," said Transport Canada spokesman Winston Smith.

Passengers will be required to stay in their seats, with their belts securely fastened, for the duration of the flight. For short-haul flights, passengers will be provided complementary adult diapers. Long-haul flyers will be issued personal catheters.

"We feel this strikes the necessary balance between protecting passenger safety and avoiding unnecessary traveller embarrassment," Smith said.

While civil libertarians and others soft on terrorism suggested the new policy was an affront to human dignity, public response was muted.

"This is public safety we're talking about here," said Edmonton passenger Saaphtee Pherst, 52.

"If you have a problem with it, then don't fly."

The Edmonton Airport Authority is asking long-haul passengers to arrive six hours ahead of their departure time to be fitted for catheters.

---

The EdJour.com

January 7, 2020

In a move designed to restore public confidence in air travel, Transport Canada has announced it is moving to align with a new American policy that requires that all airline passengers be placed in pre-flight cryogenic suspension.

"We believe that flash-freezing will maximize both passenger safety and passenger comfort," said federal spokesman Winston Smith. "Ever since we banned people from taking books, magazines, computers and food aboard planes, and made it illegal for them to get out of their seats, air travel has become unduly tedious. This way, we eliminate any terrorism and boredom, and allow passengers to arrive safe and well-rested, without jet lag. And since we'll be able rip out the seats and stack passengers like cordwood, we'll be able to make more efficient use of space and fuel."

Federal spokesman Reductio Ad-Absurdum said cryogenics was a proven technology with minimal health risks.

The Edmonton Airport Authority is asking all passengers to report to the airport 24 hours before their flight for freezing.

The EdJour.com

January 2, 2021

---

Air UnitedCanNorthWestDeltaKLMVirginJALEl-AlJet, the world's sole surviving airline, filed for creditor protection this week in the wake of a disastrous Christmas travel season. A climate of fear, combined with fears about climate change, meant no one flew anywhere.

"Flying was no longer exciting or convenient," said business analyst Noitall Pundit. "The Age of the Airplane is over."

Travel Alberta is now asking people to travel by low-carbon donkey instead, and to stay strictly within a 100-mile radius of home.

"Foreign travel is dangerous and overrated. So are foreigners," said spokeswoman Pollyanna Xenophobe. "Alberta is the promised land. Really, no one should ever want leave it again."

Labels: air travel, airlines, humour, privacy

Slate always has a good selection of editorial cartoons here. This one's pretty good ...

Labels: humour, privacy

After the recent spate of toilet cam stories (Canadian Privacy Law Blog: Montreal mall fake toilet-cam raising concerns, Canadian Privacy Law Blog: Montreal Second Cup owner forced to take down bathroom surveillance camera), I was at first shocked, puzzled and then amused by the sticker that was posted on Boing Boing. It had been spotted in a bathroom in a San Francisco coffee shop. It turns out it was part of a prank created by Sean Savage at Cheesebikini, though commentators at Boing Boing say they were originally part of a set of stickers produced by Maxim Magazine. In the interests of science, I've discovered that there are others who put stickers up in bathrooms suggesting you are being watched, including a Flickr user who puts labels of "THIS IS A CAMERA" on bathroom fittings. For more info and a handy PDF to make your own labels, see: cheesebikini? » Blog Archive » Bathroom Prank.

Labels: humour, privacy, surveillance, video surveillance

Labels: humour, privacy

Labels: humour, privacy, schneier

This is the oldest joke in the privacy business, but privacy cartoons are rare so this merits a mention:

Labels: humour, privacy

An Australian with a sense of humour got his cat a credit card to test his bank's "identity security":

Bank issues credit card to cat

SYDNEY, Jan 4 (Reuters Life!) - An Australian bank has apologized for issuing a credit card to a cat after its owner decided to test the bank's identity security system.

The Bank of Queensland issued a credit card to Messiah the cat when his owner Katherine Campbell applied for a secondary card on her account under its name.

"I just couldn't believe it. People need to be aware of this and banks need to have better security," Campbell told local media on Thursday.

The bank said the cat's card had been canceled. "We apologize as this should not have happened," it said in a statement.

Labels: humour, privacy

Labels: humour, privacy

I am confident that I would not suggest that a client put this on its website, but I found it to be the funniest website privacy policy I've ever read. (I am also confident that the words "funny" and "privacy policy" don't hang out together all that often. Like ever.)

SoutheastTexasLive.com - Southeast Texas' ONLY online entertainment page

Southeast Texas Live Privacy Policy

I. Privacy Policy:

Subsection z: Caution. This Privacy Policy contains humor and is actually pretty funny. If you have been told you have a lousy sense of humor or you do not appreciate simple (my mom calls it potty) humor please CLICK HERE for our serious (and legal) privacy policy. By continuing to read past this point and not reading the serious privacy policy, you agree not complain if you are offended in any way and agree to the legality of our legal privacy policy (which is the exact same, just not funny. At all.) And just so you know, by accessing and using this website, you agree to abide by our privacy policy and furthermore hold SoutheastTexasLive.com, its parent companies, shareholders, investors, and business partners blameless for any disagreement you may have over content, opinions, photos, headlines, or anything else contained within this website or on the websites of our partners and advertisers. Cool?

A. Personal Information We will only collect the personally identifiable information you willingly provide to us, such as your name, address and email address. If you choose not to provide us with information we ask for when filling out forms, forums, contests, and anything else you may encounter we ask you not give us intentionally fake information. For instance, do not give us your friends or neighbor's phone numbers as a substitute for your own. This way, if we call you at 4 o'clock in the morning, we know we are bothering the right person. Your personal information is used by us to respond to your requests, to process your transactions, for administrative purposes, to process prizes, and to send you information about SoutheastTexasLive.com's programs and, occasionally, advertising/promotional material from some of its advertising and strategic partners. You are more than welcome to give us nicknames, pseudonym, alias, tag, street name, handle, stage name, Christian name, affectionate name, or title. Just make sure that if we call you at 4 o'clock in the morning that you will know it is you with whom we are asking to speak. We may also use your personal information for internal business purposes, such as analyzing and managing our businesses.

B. Financial Information We will only collect your financial information such as account or credit card numbers, from you when you make purchases on this site. We will use your financial information to process your transactions. We will never store this information online or use it to buy our girlfriend something pretty. By making a purchase on this site, you consent to our providing your financial information to our service providers and to such third parties as we determine is necessary to process your transactions. These third parties may include the credit card companies and banking institutions used to process the transaction. They may also include the U.S. Government if subpeoned because they need to study terrorist purchasing t-shirts, music, and newspapers. For this, we apologize on behalf of our government.

C. Demographic Information We may also collect demographic data, such as your date of birth, gender, and zip code. Demographic data may be used to tailor your experience at this site, such as showing you content including special events and advertising that you might be interested in, and displaying the content according to your zip code. We're not really this advanced yet, but it helps to have all our ducks in a row. We promise not to tell your friends if you happen to like visiting our children's area or wearing women's clothing. We mean you John.

On occasion, aggregate information that does not identify any particular user may be compiled and shared with strategic partners, merchants and advertisers. We had to look up aggregate on dictionary.com too. Don't feel bad.

D. Passive Collection of Non-Personal Information. This site often requires the use of encrypted or non-encrypted cookies, pieces of information that a web site places in a file on your computer associated with your browser that may be used to deliver content specific to your interests and for other purposes, such as security and other account administrative functions, and which may track personal identifying information. This information is processed passively by your browser as you surf through this site. You CANNOT dunk these cookies in milk. Nor can you reheat them in the oven. Attempting to do so may result in complete equipment failure and possibly void your manufacturer's warranty. IF you were lucky enough to get one without paying an arm and leg for it.

II. Disclosure of Information to Third Parties

A. Strategic Partners From time to time we may enter into a special relationship with another company that is not owned by or affiliated with SoutheastTexasLive.com to provide additional features on this site. We assure you this is merely a plutonic relationship and you will never see us kissing in public. These special relationships may include business partners, sponsors, and co-branded sites (referred to here as “co-branded sites”). Any information, including personal information, that you provide on one of these co-branded sites will be shared with these third party partners. Don't worry, they have been tested for virus' and have had their shots. By participating in activities or providing your information on these co-branded sites, you also consent to our providing your personal information to those third parties. Since these third parties will use your information in accordance with their own privacy practices, you should check their Web sites for information regarding their individual privacy policies. We doubt their policies will be as entertaining as ours, but you already knew that.

B. Service Providers We may use third party service providers to help us operate our business and this site or administer activities on our behalf, such as authorization of credit card transactions, order fulfillment, and sweepstakes administration. We may share your information with these third parties for those limited purposes. For instance, if you participate in a sweepstakes, game, or loyalty program resulting in a prize or award, we will share personally identifiable information about you to our games and merchandise fulfillment and management agencies. This may include your name, physical description, baby photos of you, embarassing morning "candids", pet names (like 'Snookie' or 'Cuddly-Bear'), or the ever popular "look how far I'm sticking my finger up my nose" shot.

C. Other Disclosures Unless specified in this Privacy Statement or another activity-specific privacy statement, personally identifiable information of any individual user is never shared with other companies outside SoutheastTexasLive.com, except as follows: (i) as permitted by law, (ii) in the event of a transfer of ownership, assets or a bankruptcy of SoutheastTexasLive.com, (iii) where we determine that disclosure of specific information is necessary to comply with the request of a law enforcement or regulatory agency, (iv) to protect the interests or safety of SoutheastTexasLive.com or other visitors to this site (v) . We will never use your information to ask you on a date, blackmail you, or locate your home to toilet paper it.

III. LINKS AND THIRD PARTIES' PRIVACY PRACTICES

This site may contain links to other sites which are not operated by SoutheastTexasLive.com. SOUTHEASTTEXASLIVE.COM IS NOT RESPONSIBLE FOR THE PRIVACY PRACTICES OR THE CONTENT OF SUCH OTHER WEB SITES. SoutheastTexasLive.com recommends that you review the privacy policy of third party Web sites arrived at from links on this site. You agree to hold us blameless for any naughty words, naughty content, offensive imagery, or other questionable things you may come across in your web travels. This includes seeing your mother or teacher naked. Yes, we said naked. Naked. We mean nude, though.

IV. OPT-IN/CHOICE

This site provides you with the opportunity to opt-in to receive weekend updates and partner notices from SoutheastTexasLive.com. If you do not opt-in, SoutheastTexasLive.com will not send you its promotional offers or someone to your house to break your legs. We're just not that way. However, regardless of your opt-in preferences, sexual bias, religious choices, and whether you really do like long walks on the beach at sunset, SoutheastTexasLive.com may still at times need to send program emails for administrative reasons. Note: Your opt-out preference may not be retroactive in certain instances where you agreed to receive brand-specific communications. SoutheastTexasLive.com also gives you convenient methods for removing your information from our database so as not to receive future communications or to close your account:

• Email us @ TakeMyNameOffYourList@southeasttexaslive.com Please put "I still love you" as the headline to make our webmaster feel better. • You may send mail to the following postal address:

SoutheastTexasLive.com Website Customer Care 380 Main Street Beaumont, TX 77701

• Or just cry and whine about it to your friends and family and hope something gets done.

V. UPDATES TO THIS PRIVACY STATEMENT

SoutheastTexasLive.com reserves the right to make changes in this Privacy Statement. In the event that SoutheastTexasLive.com makes a material change to this Privacy Statement, it will be posted here. We encourage you to check this page regularly since your continued use of this site following any changes to this Privacy Statement will be deemed to constitute your acceptance of such change. This includes your agreeance to fork over your first born upon demand and the transferance of any inheritance to us should we decide to put that in. And you may have to take us out for dinner one night. Or a movie. We haven't decided.

VI. REVIEWING/CORRECTING/UPDATING YOUR INFORMATION

This site gives you several options for reviewing, correcting, updating or otherwise modifying information you have previously provided:

• Email us @ ChangeMyInfo@southeasttexaslive.com Please put "please" as the headline to make our webmaster feel wanted. • You may send mail to the following postal address:

SoutheastTexasLive.com Website Customer Care 380 Main Street Beaumont, TX 77701 Please note, changes may not be effective immediately if at all. And it's not our fault. It's your mother's.

VII. CONTACTING SOUTHEASTTEXASLIVE.COM

If you have any questions about this Privacy Statement, the practices of the this site, you may contact:

SoutheastTexasLive.com Website Customer Care 380 Main Street Beaumont, TX 77701 Telephone # 409-880-0718 http://www.southeasttexaslive.com/contactUs.html

When writing, please include your name, the problem, pie (or cake), and a return address (so if it's a nasty letter we can toilet paper your house).

Labels: humour, privacy

This hilarious animated editorial cartoon by Newsday's Walt Handelsman is a must see: Walt Handelsman: N.S.A. Wiretapping. Thanks to Daniel Solove at Concurring Opinions for the great link.

Labels: humour, privacy, surveillance

Daryl Cagle's Professional Cartoonists Index

Labels: humour, information breaches

Another great privacy cartoon from the New Yorker: Vet your Date.

Technorati Tags: Privacy :: Cartoon.

Labels: humour, information breaches

Thanks to Bruce Schneier for leading me to this great RFID Cartoon.

It's funny because it's true.

Labels: humour, information breaches, rfid, schneier

Chris Slane has some absolutely brilliant cartoons related to privacy. I just happened upon this one that is worth checking out.

Labels: humour, information breaches

Thanks to Bruce Schneier for pointing to this great cartoon: False sense of security.

Labels: humour, information breaches, schneier

From NetworkWorld:

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Labels: humour, information breaches

Michael de Adder is the editorial cartoonist for the Halifax Daily News. Today, he's taking a cynical look at the surveillance society in England following the London bombings. Click the image (or the red X!).

Labels: humour, information breaches, surveillance

Couldn't help but post this, from Cagle's Cartoon Index:

Labels: humour, information breaches, surveillance

InternetCases is running a summary of a recent Maine decision in which the Court ordered cable provider Time Warner to disclose the identity of an individual who allegedly impersonated the plaintiff in the case, sending an offensive cartoon. The US legislation requires that the cable company give the John Doe notice of the request; in this case, the unnamed individual was represented at the hearing:

InternetCases.com: Time Warner Ordered to Identify Sender of Offensive Email:

"In the case of Fitch v. Doe, the Supreme Court of Maine has held that while the Cable Communications Policy Act of 1984 generally prohibits a cable operator's disclosure of subscriber information, an exception provided in the Act allows disclosure to nongovernmental entities pursuant to court order, so long as the subscriber has received notification thereof.

On Christmas Eve 2003, an anonymous person sent an email under Plaintiff Fitch's name with a derogatory cartoon attached. Fitch filed suit in Maine state court against the unknown sender of the email (John or Jane Doe). Fitch then sought an order directing Time Warner (the ISP of the account from which the message was sent) to disclose Doe's identity. Doe's counsel objected to the disclosure, arguing that the disclosure was forbidden by the Cable Communications Policy Act of 1984, 47 U.S.C.A. s 551 (the 'Act'), and that Doe did not consent to allow Time Warner to disclose his identity. The trial court ordered disclosure, finding that Doe's agreement with Time Warner provided such consent.

Doe appealed to the Maine Supreme Court, but the lower court's decision to order disclosure was affirmed. Although the court concluded that the lower court erred in determining Doe had consented to disclosure, such disclosure was authorized under an exception found in the Act...."

Labels: breach notification, humour, information breaches

Labels: choicepoint, humour, identity theft, information breaches