10/16/2009 -
As information such as passwords and account numbers moves from computer to computer across the Internet, it is encrypted—jumbled into a non-comprehensible form.
Encryption occurs when two parties—your personal computer and Amazon.com, for example—connect and exchange a “key.” Your browser then encrypts the information you want to send (like a credit card number), it flows in a jumble to Amazon, and then Amazon decrypts it based on the key that the two computers exchanged.
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09/29/2009 -
From: The University of Texas at Austin News| Digital Security Program
AUSTIN, Texas — University of Texas at Austin scientists have shown that they can break "Vanish," a program that promised to self-destruct computer data, such as emails and photographs, and thereby protect a person's privacy.
There is no way to permanently delete any material posted or sent through the Internet, and this leaves people's information vulnerable to breaches in privacy.
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