This post was inspired by an article entitled Social Media Privacy is an Oxymoron. It sparked some thoughts for me around how one can achieve at least *some* privacy online; assuming this is important to you because for a surprising number of people, it isn’t.
First off – Facebook. Many informative posts have been written about controlling your privacy or removing yourself from Facebook altogether. Some high-profile Facebook users are taking a stand against recent changes on Facebook affecting privacy. And you may have heard by now that “Quit Facebook Day” is scheduled for May 31, 2010. Before you quit, you may want to first determine what amount of your private info on Facebook is exposed. This application, as well as this one can help you do that.
But while all the attention and heat is on Facebook, what about everything else? Among, what is undoubtedly, a myriad of vulnerabilities on the big old web, here are just a few ideas that may help you stay a little more private.
To prevent the tracking of my every click, I like to use CoolPreviews. This is a tool that allows me to see what’s behind a link without having to click on it. I like to use this a lot when logged into LinkedIn or Twitter, as the tracking of where and what you click can be scrutinized. For example, if you notice a tweet was posted via Hootsuite, and the link provided is an OWLY link, your click will be counted. Not a huge deal perhaps as your click, in this case anyway, is in no way connected to your account. (At least, not that I’m aware of.) On LinkedIn however, if you are logged in and you check out someone’s profile, your “click” as it were, *is* linked to your profile. This enables this cool-but -creepy feature.
There is a long list of ways to add more privacy to your browsing habits. Many browsers like Safari and Firefox now offer ‘Private Browsing‘ ensuring you that no website you open will be kept on record. Anywhere. There are also many types of ‘scramblers’ you can use that mask your IP address. These are called proxy servers. This can help prevent data collection on where you are in this universe, what browser you’re using, what kind of computer you’re using, among other things. Want to know what your IP reveals about you? Go here.
Google Analytics and Quantcast, as two examples, are now offering “opt out” options. Google Analytics, for one, is allowing people to opt out of being monitored for receiving targeted ads.
Quantcast, an American based service that measures audience statistics for websites, is offering something similar.
This is just the tip of the iceberg for ways of preserving privacy online. The questions I have are:
Is it too little too late?
Is it time to redefine what online privacy means?
Should we care this much? Everyone is up in arms over the privacy principle, but is the privacy practice (the way our private info is being used) really that offensive and/or scary?
I’d love to hear what you think.
Tags: advertising, facebook, Google Analytics, LinkedIn, opt out, privacy, proxy servers, Quantcast, Twitter
Marg Martin
May 21st, 2010
Hey Erin
Enjoyed your article. I took advantage of the links you included…thanks. I am intensely interested in internet privacy . As one who falls in the venerable and ancient category of internet /social media users, I am bonded to the “old ” notions of privacy. Does it need redefining? Perhaps.
Interesting though, when I read the motivating article, ” Social Media Privacy is an Oxymoron”, # 1 of the author’s fundamental principal’s was ” #1. Don’t say or write anything you wouldn’t want the world to see.” My mother who would have been 101 this year, told my siblings and me repeatedly: “You can think what you want, but never say or write anything you would not want to hear over the radio!” A different time and technology but still, sound familiar?
Perhaps it is now personal choice. If one wishes to have their friends, friends of friends and onwards to the whole world know everything about them, and comment on same, then one must be ready to accept the consequences, however awesome, or dreadful.
As for me, well you have my name and my email, and that’s it. And I do need to know privacy polices, and whats an opt in or an opt out for it to be a choice.