New privacy tool from Electronic Frontier Foundation
A lot of times, default installations of Linux will log various activities. Some of these logs are very useful for tracking down system (and user) problems. Some of them keep a little too much data...
From the
EFF website:
bq.
EFF Announces New Privacy Tool
Logfinder Helps Eliminate Unwanted Logging of Personal Data
bq. Today the Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF) released logfinder, a software tool to help people reduce the unnecessary collection of personal information about computer users. Often computer network servers automatically log information about who has visited a website and when, or who has sent and received email. Such data tells a lot about a user's browsing and email habits and could be used in privacy-invasive ways. Moreover, log data must be turned over to government entities with court orders and can be subpoenaed by opposing sides in court cases.
bq. By finding unwanted log files, logfinder informs system administrators when their servers are collecting personal data and gives them the opportunity to turn logging off if it isn't gathering information necessary for administering the system.
The
download is a 40KB TAR file which has a 10K python script, readme file and the GNU Licensing text. Looks good so far...
A major hat tip to
BoingBoing for this one!
Posted by DaveH at February 8, 2005 12:21 PM