Private Information

With Facebook under huge pressure from consumers and governments alike the thought of protecting private web based information is almost oxymoronic. As we continue to move at light speed further into the internet age we release more and more information to the optic fibres and routers, in 1's and 0's across the globe. The web is as close to a public medium as it gets.

I write here to somewhat stand on the side of Facebook and Google, although I too feel vulnerable to personal information theft. As a fan of social media and an active social media user I am well aware of the risks. I have become more comfortable with this risk simply because I think it would be naive to think that my personal information could not be dragged up from a server other than Facebook's.

I mention here some current movements and some trends that should scare us more but we chose to focus our range on one or two players in the space.

IT outsourcing, with all it's security and protection, is a fundamental part of business today. It provides cost competitiveness and comparative advantages over insourcing. I do not intend on questioning the integrity of outsourcing providers however the risk is present that the huge number of banks, utility and other service oriented businesses have provided access to their databases for outsourcers to provide their service. It is only a matter of time before something untoward happens.

Active web users like me have their thoughts in blogs and twitters, their identity in FB, Xing, LinkedIN and much more on the web. Again, it's a matter of choice but who knows who is digging elsewhere. I'm not a location based app user because it would simply list me in the lecture hall all day and all night! However http://pleaserobme.com/ highlighted that. I even heard of a friend using it to trace his steps from the big night he'd had before. Someone else could do the same....

We hear future trends are cloud computing. Again, a key adoption hurdle is the feeling of security. No matter what security software is in place, only one misplaced iPhone at a bar, or a laptop in a taxi can undo all that effort.

Google is in trouble by the regulators because they did something the Government could have checked against many years ago. Everyone who uses Gmail or any google application has exposed many times more information to Google than their Street View scan collected. So what's the big deal. The collection of wifi data is something we do all day everyday. By sitting at a cafe we are always looking for an unsecured wifi to tap into. If I cared I probably could tap into that available information too. In college days it was called 'neighbour net' giving us access to free internet outside our college quota thanks to the neighbours wifi. Even before that I had a friend whose parents wouldn't allow an internet connection so he would walk down the street to see what he could access. Again it's a global issue but unfortunately for Google the goggles are on them.

So with these examples I feel empathy for the flack Facebook and Google are getting. I don't agree that Facebook's privacy settings being changed to default settings was good at all but do believe it is naive to think that social media is our only personal information leak to anyone who might care to know.