New Concerns Over Online Privacy
http://thedianerehmshow.org/shows/2012-02-20/new-concerns-over-online-privacy
Technology companies collect vast amounts of information about you and your habits. In return, you get free content, play games and connect with friends. But recent findings are raising concerns over security and privacy. A Stanford researcher discovered Google and other companies bypassing the privacy settings on Apple's Safari web browser. An app company called Path was collecting and storing personal address book information without permission. And an FTC report on children’s app privacy showed parents are not getting information on what data is being collected, how it is being shared, or who will have access. Diane and her guests discuss privacy and transparency in our rapidly changing computer world
Guests
Marc Rotenberg
executive director of the Electronic Privacy Information Center and teaches Information Privacy Law at Georgetown University Law Center.
Rep. Edward Markey
Democratic Congressman from Massachusetts, co-chair of the Bipartisan Congressional Privacy Caucus.
Cecilia Kang
technology reporter for the Washington Post.
Jonathan Mayer
a graduate student in computer science and law at Stanford University.
Morgan Reed
executive director of the Association for Competitive Technology.
Comments
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The ubiquitous collection of information about individuals is the basis for a police state. Confining the discussion of collection of personal information to the commercial use of that information is a shallow discussion. In regards to the one of your guests, children and adults need a remedy for essentially unregulated collection of personal data.
I've been using Google and Facebook mail for a long time, for years in fact. It's interesting that these companies would actually store everything and encourage you to "archive" your content instead of delete it. If you archive your emails & chat history (Facebook), it basically gets put into a black hole where THEY have access to it for any purpose they wish to use it for and you basically forget that it's there.
Until these sites have better privacy controls like an auto-delete function for older data, I'm using tools like Privacy Check (www.rabidgremlin.com/fbprivacy/) and FBSweeper (www.fbsweeper.com) to monitor privacy and delete message content I don't want "out there" forever in cyberland. Also, I never "archive" content on either site because it's like a closet you just cram stuff into and never look at again. Not a good idea.
It's also ironic how Google would stumble with the Safari gaff at the same time that it's going through the motions to consolidate their own tracking databases between services. This isn't "evil" per se, it's just stupid and greedy.
Glad to see someone articulate this clearly.
One should ask if the business model is a problem! I will never defend a company with a profit margin (they're capable of self defense) so please don't mistake my intent - they make a boatload of money in, and they spend more than 3/4 of it on infrastructure and services. Read Google's 10-K, how much they grossed, and what it cost to deliver what people take for free.
No online (or offline) business will be accused of selfless charity, but from a personal POV, the user is getting more than he or she ever could from the internet with Google (or Bing or Baidu or ... ) than without.
It's a deal I'll stick with. Your mileage may vary.
Hey, Longfeather, try downloading and running a program called malwarebytes. It will get rid of the viruses that are on your computer. The "basic" version is free and will probably clean up most of what you have. Also, set pop-up blocker on in your browser.
http://www.malwarebytes.org/products/malwarebytes_free
Pogo's note is a good point - many businesses function better, thanks to tracking! Here is the report I got from a plug-in developed by a group called Sheepish:
Adify
http://ad.afy11.net/srad.js?azId=1000000590216
Google Adsense
http://partner.googleadservices.com/gampad/google_service.js
http://partner.googleadservices.com/gampad/google_ads.js
http://pagead2.googlesyndication.com/pagead/osd.js
Google Analytics
http://www.google-analytics.com/ga.js
Quantcast
http://edge.quantserve.com/quant.js
ShareThis
http://w.sharethis.com/button/sharethis.js#publisher=10c29ebd-6851-4c57-...
http://w.sharethis.com/share4x/js/st.bc9360fc2c53399yy51caf17dd6ae7.js
The point here is that some vendors are tracking you for more than one customer. Presumably, so they can provide ad content to you that's more interesting than Sham WOW! commercials.
Two key failures of the information model underlying this practice: (1) advertisers falsely assume that what an on-line account searches for is what a person is interested in; (2) using automatically-aggregated data to change how a person will be treated is imposing identity on the human "tied" to the accounts. The worst of American experience and behavior has at its core imposing identity on others in order to "justify" treating those people differently (slavery, Japanese-American prison camps in WWII, and many other et ceteras). I work in a hiring position that requires me to screen applicants for image, including tattoos. When I can't verify a tattoo meaning based on my life experience, I search the internet using the description the applicant provides to validate the claim. Those searches represent what I do not know about, ****which is a priori not what I am interested in****. Unfortunately, I now get pop-up ads that have nothing to do with my interests.... I'm certain the future holds hiring screening programs that review the on-line "identity" based on internet use. Currently American consumers have credit scores and a means to challenge derogatory information therein; how would one go about challenging an "aggregated on-line identity?"
For me it is less about the actual policy than it is about the change in mid stream. Am I too dependent on Google? Probably, but now I'm going to rethink my dependence. They have proven themselves untrustworthy. What's to stop them in the future from changing their policies again?
I run malwarebytes, it is the optic nerve trying to read text while its attention is being waved at from a point known by all people and nations, guranteed to hit the motion sensor. Since my nerve has limited capacity, I detest the wavers. I call them Scaliwags and Carpetbaggers, and Preachers with their tents. But thanks for thinking of me.
I think that it comes down to business ethics and the ability of the competing companies to protect their customers and users of the programs from ideas and practices that are made available given the technology and market. People need to be conscious and aware that they are showing themselves to others while on-line and on their phones. Their does not need to be more government intervention on this. This topic suggests the importance of a small and limited Federal government. We do not need more precedents and invitations to Federal over-site of personal habits. People do not need to be protected from them-selves. People/consumers need to be actively conscious and aware that they are creating them-selves with their habits and tendencies. If a company wishes to collect information via their services, I liken that to a video camera on private property.
The spin from all the commentators on air regarding this story is what is scary, and seems to me, to be VERY misleading to the public on this issue. It is my understanding that Google and others are changing their privacy policies, to combine all data collected in to one pool of data, as a means to remove the identities from the data collected, and make it 'impossible' to ass...ociate data by person. This way trends and other data is still captured, but does not infringe on personal identity. It is my understanding Google and others are doing this as a means of PROTECTING consumers from increasing advertiser and US govt. demands for data records! The panelists, especially Rep. Markey from MA, is full of it, and no doubt on the take from advertising lobbys! OPT IN in lieu of public having to OPT OUT is a great and wise solution to this. For Markey from MA to rebut why Europe uses OPT IN vs. individuals having to OPT OUT as it relates to internet privacy and you, with a statement about european's being more sensative to identity following their experience with Nazis and WWII is CRAZY and should be everyone's red flag right there! If any country should be identity sensative, it is the US following the patriot act (and others) because our govt. repeatedly keeps lying to us and misrepresenting our interests in favor of the corporate interest! DIANE, you have to be above this. If this does not come out in the show, I can't trust NPR any farther than I can FOX or any other mass media. Is this how you guys succomb to govt. threats of removing funding? Misrepresenting the truth? Google, an 'evil' company. HA! What a sick joke! Sad too, that I posted this on DR's FB page, and it was removed (twice). ergo, the truth... simply press delete. So sad.
Grateful to have people like Jonathan Mayer, a rational voice on an important show.
The trends aren't looking great.
I'd disagree with some of the commentary - We could (like some European nations do) enjoy stronger individual protections and still provide better services to people - in our own civic interest, and avoid feeding a bloated and obtrusive marketing industry taking the associated risks (government institutions aren't exempt- leaks, Patriot Act, etc.)
Until we address the legal issues, those taking web privacy into their own hands will find it can be 95% effective and free.
Might start by reading about privacy controls on browsers' web sites and searching about privacy and browser 'addons' for this - "Ghostery", just to name one available for several major browsers.
What? Virtually every site on the internet has ads. Every company that owns more than one internet product tries to consolidate the logins and features of its products. Your private data is not exposed to these advertisers by Google unless you click on the ads. Google serves the ads and only provides non-personally identifiable information back to the advertisers. I've paid to advertise on Google, so have seen this first hand.
Exactly. Sorry, but you folks have it backwards.
Under Google, Facebook, and the others, we are products being delivered to advertisers and corporations. Advertisers pay to keep the systems online and Google, Facebook, and the others deliver the goods - you and your information. That's how the money flows and that's the REAL service being provided. It's that simple.
In other words, Google, Facebook, and the others exist to deliver your information to advertisers. They DO NOT exist to bring you a free service.
And , if you don't want to share your information, are you willing to pay to user Google? Facebook? If not, then why should they offer anything for free? Because they're nice people? Don't be stupid. Someone has to pay for the thousands of servers and disk drives and if you won't, who will? ADVERTISERS, that's who.
"barkway wrote:
Google is fast becoming simply a distributor of personally identifiable info and much less a "search" company. Has anyone else noticed how bad search results from Google have become over the years? Boolean operators don't even work as they used to to weed out irrelevant results...
Is the only alternative for maintaining privacy to go completely off-grid?
February 20, 2012 - 10:54 am"
Try AltaVista http://www.altavista.com
It has a much better Search Engine, perhaps a smaller data base.....
Just went and searched for the 2 words- Poverty exaggerated and found 5,470,000 hits on Google and AltaVista found 6,020,000.
I suppose AltaVista must do something to fund their operations, but the Site is clearly cleaner.
Every new iteration of Google removes useful features and/or screws others for G_d knows which reasons.
They remove the quotes on phrases turning the Search into C_ap.
Click on a Hit then find that they have overwritten your Search Terms.
Removed the Cache Function which is invaluable for several good reasons.
Monte Haun mchaun@hotmail.com
Thanks for having this show.
Edward Markey's "erase" button: Any browser lets you clear your cookies in a few clicks. The free tool, "ccleaner" allows you to clear some cookies and not others (on Windows).
Cecilia Kang doesn't want to see Justin Bieber Ads or have advertisers see her work emails. Log out of Google services and have your son log in to his own account. Advertisers do NOT see your emails. Google anonymously matches text from your email to ads. Mac doesn't track you? You can't activate or update your iPhone without connecting it to iTunes where you have an account.
Edward Markey says Silicon Valley thinks, "privacy: you don't have any, get over it." You can't bolt privacy onto the web any more than bolting fins to a car will turn it into a submarine. By default, every packet of data you send is visible to everyone on your local network, or to everyone within reception range if you are wireless. It is then visible to the company you pay for internet connectivity, at every node it passes through on the internet, to your mail provider, or the web site you visit.
Ads are the only place an end-user gets any visible feedback that their data is being observed, but serious online privacy crimes being committed every second: address book looting, identity theft, online stalking, child pornography, viruses, trojan horses, keystroke loggers, international sepionage, corporate espionage, account break-ins, and warrentless criminal investigations. None of these has anything to do with tracking cookies or advertising. Let's work on a solution to those issues. Being this upset about seeing ads which actually might match your interests, makes no sense to me.