A week full of loaded privacy news.

The New York Times, The Guardian and ProPublica, had revealed information about how the N.S.A. is using well-placed backdoors to crack down the basic encryption of the Internet, including SSL (and its HTTPS implementation), VPNs, SSH and many more protocols. So, after we’ve learned that service providers work directly with the N.S.A, we now know that infrastructure makers had probably done the same. As Bruce Schneier convincingly argues, the implications for trust in the Internet are dire.

The Acxiom Corporation, a marketing company that has build vast databases on most American, including details on the household income, financial background, and shopping preferences, is trying a new strategy: total openness. It had created a new Website, Aboutthedata.com, which allows people to view and edit the personal details that the company stores about them in its marketing databases. The wesbite has sparked a discussion about the inaccuracy of some of its information and its security.