People face many privacy
challenges and decisions every day, most of the time without knowing it.
Privacy has slowly changed over time and this slow metamorphosis has gone
unnoticed by many. Most people do not make connections with their decisions and
how it affects their privacy. As quoted in Blown to Bits, West (1967)
defines privacy as the claim of people to determine for themselves the extent
in which information about them is conveyed to others. This definition leaves a
lot to interpretation. Even the Merriam-Webster definition, freedom from
unauthorized intrusion, leaves much to interpretation. Additionally, societal
values have shifted over the years due to the ease of access of information.
Hence, privacy has shifted and continues to shift.
In current times,
privacy faces three distinct challenges. First and foremost, simple or naïve
views of people add to the issue of keeping information private. Government,
corporations, and businesses collect millions of informational bits on
everyone. RFID, microphones, facial recognition, online activity, and much more
record every second of our day. RFID tags reside on car tires, credit cards,
tags in clothes, shoes, smart passes, phones, driver licenses, food packaging,
and much more. Cell phones provide an easy privacy invader to unexpecting
owners. Cell phones incorporate GPS technology to track your movement, a
microphone that could be turned on at any time, personal information like
contacts that could be downloaded off the phone, and apps that record everything
you do on your phone. Surveillance cameras at ATMs, red lights, convenience
stores, and a plethora of other locations capture your movement and can
identify you through sophisticated facial recognition software. Additionally,
every time people accept online privacy policies to open new accounts to the
latest social media or web 2.0 sites, they give up their information that they
list on the site. Also, cookies track people’s surfing habits. Let’s not forget
about privacy destruction of malware. Even computers not plugged into the
Internet can leak information through the Van Eck phreaking method (TechTarget,
2001). Furthermore to scare people more, conversations can be tapped from afar
by simply observing the vibrations of your windows while you’re in the car or
at home (Szczys, 2010).
The bleak picture
painted above leads us to believe that nothing is sacred anymore. However, an
informed person can take steps to keep their privacy intact. First, a person
must realize that RFID tags can only be read within 15 feet. If they really
want to prevent their information from being read, they can always line their
wallets with aluminum foil and purchase a RFID detector to find and remove the
RFID chips. With cell phones, users should always keep their phones locked with
a pass code, turn Bluetooth off when not in use (Bluetooth worm can steal the
users information), and if they really want their information private, users
can remove the battery when the phone is not in use. Although it’s nearly
impossible today to avoid surveillance cameras, there are several steps a
person can take to avoid drawing attention to them, like not acting suspicious
to looking straight ahead. Additionally, people can keep information private by
not posting every detail of their lives online that they do not want others to
know. In addition, cookies can be deleted on regular basis or turned off
completing by adjusting user settings. In essence, people need to make
intelligent decisions about their everyday tasks. Furthermore, people need to
realize by ignoring these privacy issues does not make them go away. They need
to learn and adapt to the new emerging technology.
The second challenge to
privacy entails inaccuracy in collected information. Amazon does an excellent
job of tracking our purchases and trying to suggest new items that we may be
interested in purchases. For instance, I purchase many gifts on Amazon because
of the convenience of shopping online. However, Amazon thinks that I have
purchased these items for myself and I often receive email from Amazon letting
me know when similar products are on sale. The same issue will occur if you
purchase gifts and use a store’s convenience card. Now you are tagged as liking
the gift you purchased when it may not interest you personally.
A potential method of
combating this privacy issue is contacting the vendor. In most cases, you can
have the item removed from the list that is associated with you. This process
is easier with some vendors than it is with others. Some allow you to email or
fill out a web form; whereas, others make you jump through multiple hoops to
remove the association with a gift and your list.
The third challenge and
probably the most damaging involve re-identification of associated information.
Many vendors collect and sell or post personal collected information on the
web. Typically, the information is de-indentified. However, if several
de-identified lists of information are combined in one database, chances are
that several people can be identified through triangulation methods. The AOL
information release and the MIT students who identify 8,000 of 11,000 victims
are just mere examples of how you can be identified with the information
available on the Internet (Abelson, Ledeen, and Lewis, 2011). As you can
imagine, this challenge poses more complicated measures to avoid being
re-identified.
The three privacy
challenges of naïve views, inaccurate collection, and re-identification create
real issues for people who try to live a private life. The challenges can be
over come through taking special measures. Abelson, Ledeen, and Lewis (2008)
explain the situation the best when they ask, “… how can we make ourselves less
vulnerable to the downsides of living in such an exposed world?” (p. 22). On
the other hand you can take the opposite view like Sun Microsystems CEO Scott
McNealy proclaims, “You have zero privacy anyway! Get over it!” (Landy and
Mastrobattista,2008, p. 453). Mainly, keep yourself informed, make a decision
on your privacy, and stick to your privacy plan.
References
Abelson, H., Ledeen, K.,
and Lewis, H. (2008). Blown toBits: Your Life, Liberty, and Happiness After the
Digital Explosion. Addison-Wesley: NJ.
Landy, G., and
Mastrobattista, A. (2008). The IT / DigitalLegal Companion: A Comprehensive
Business Guide to Software, IT, Internet, Media and IP Law. Syngress:
Burlington.
Merriam-Webster. (2012).
Privacy. Retrieved February 24, 2012 from http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/privacy.
Szczys, M. (2010). Laser
mic makes eavesdropping remarkably simple. Retrieved February 24, 2012 from http://hackaday.com/2010/09/25/laser-mic-makes-eavesdropping-remarkably-simple/.
TechTarget (2001). Van Eck
Phreaking. Retrieved February 24,2012 from http://searchsecurity.techtarget.com/definition/van-Eck-phreaking
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