2 responses to “Words, actions, privacy.”
-
[…] Words, actions, privacy. | Open (minds, finds, conversations)… – Blog | Words, action, privacy. We talk about privacy, but we don't do much about it. […]
-
Google+ does need to somehow sort out the multiple personality problem it gives you. Then again it does give you the flexibility of splitting your work/personal life. Problem is often you’re logged into both and connect with whoever connects you, sometimes accidentally just so you can IM them.
As for the “owning your data issue”, the best analogy is banks. Or best perhaps to think of traditional old fashioned banking rather than modern banking. You could put all your cash under the bed so the bank or anyone else can’t touch it. But with that comes responsibility of securing it, which is a task very complicated for the average person. Before “cloud” storage solutions like Dropbox and Gmail people had to keep copies on external hard drives and would forever lose data. Remember 2mb Hotmail accounts? Having to download your inbox to make room for more? These companies solved the problem of data lose and storage. If you lose your laptop, or phone, you haven’t lost your data forever. Although preferably you use encryption software so a random person will just format it and use the hardware, rather than your data. However they’ve been numerous cases of Government officials leaving unencrypted sensitive data on trains which is beyond belief.
If it wasn’t for the fact that people are so used to the “freemium” model, there wouldn’t be this big problem with people being the product for sale in these social networks. If, from the beginning, people were happy with paying £5/month for all the services Google offer, just as you pay money for your broadband connection, Sky etc, then they wouldn’t be so focused on how they can use your data to sell you targetted ads. I did read somewhere that was about the figure Google makes per person through advertising.
I don’t think Google, Apple, Microsoft are working secretly with the US or UK Governments and aren’t the enemy. In fact, they are powerful enough to stand up to Government spying and prevent it, much more so than independent providers, or people trying to do it themselves.
Encrypt anything that’s extremely sensitive (that could mean IP, creative works, or anything you don’t want others to know about). The only problem with this is if you lose the key, and it’s the only copy or all copies are encrypted the same, bye bye data! Although almost every encryption method can make cracked with enough time and processing power.
So really it’s about having your own levels of data privacy (like Governments, with top secret, classified info), right down to data that isn’t that private.
People have a false belief of the security of email. In fact, if you have gmail conversations with other gmail users the information is a lot more private & secure than between other providers. As generally the email will travel through unencrypted means and be readable by anyone who it passes and wants to read it.
Sometimes being overly concerned about something can lead to people making badly informed decisions based on fear, like elderly people storing a stash of cash under the bed, and losing it all in a house fire. At least the banks didn’t get a penny, but neither did you.
Leave a Reply
You must be logged in to post a comment.