Is there such a thing as online privacy?
On Friday night, we spent an interesting evening in
The focus of Friday’s talk was the ‘Future of Privacy: Rethinking Security’. It was an extremely informed insight into the digital footprint of the average person today – from Gmail accounts, social networking sites such as Facebook, through to surveillance technology set up at Government level aimed at protecting our personal security, such a security cameras and licence plate monitoring.
It’s not realistic to be a full member of today’s society without having an online or digital social footprint – whether proactively created or not. And the majority of what is captured about us digitally can help us in our daily lives – for example behavioural marketing. How many of us are still impressed by Amazon proactively offering us suggestions for other books we’re likely to enjoy based on past purchases? We’re all seduced by the convenience of what technology can offer us.
What does raise concern is that legislation is lagging behind technology developments. Technology is amazing as it disrupts and changes the balance of the way we work and live – normally for the better. To ensure there is a good balance between liberty and privacy, however, laws like the data protection act are required. And these laws need to keep pace with technological advances to ensure our licence plate details, for example, are used for the right reasons.
As is often the case, it may take a scandal for the general population to change their online habits and become more aware of sharing too much personal information online. Few people realise that a closed Facebook account still exists, it just can’t be seen. And how many of us check the privacy settings of our email and social networking accounts before blindly accepting the default option?
Bruce Schneier pointed out that it is now cheaper for companies such as Facebook and Google to retain our data than it is to destroy it.
Although I won’t be stopping writing blogs and talking to friends and family online, I will be thinking more about what I share from now on.
This talk was organised by the Open Rights Group (ORG), an organisation set up to protect the public’s rights in the digital age. Founded in 2005, ORG has become the
The talk was a real eye-opener and based on the number of questions that kept on coming at the end of the evening, I’m guessing there’s a lot of information to process both on and offline for the majority of the audience and will be for some time to come.
posted by thebluedoor at
13:22
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