Convenience Has a Price

There is no doubt that the proliferation of all things digital has provided once unbelievable conveniences in our daily lives.  Simple things like shopping or writing a letter are now made effortless with the help of computers, tablets, smart phones and other digital accoutrement.  We can ask our smart phone for directions to the closest ATM when we need cash.  Amazon not only fills our book order but makes suggestions for other reads that we might like.  Parents can keep an eye on their teenager’s comings and goings and your auto insurance company can even offer discounts if you let one of their digital recorders “ride along” with you.

I am not nor do I want others to be paranoid about big brother or big sister.  I do think that it is a good to be aware of how much information we provide to others often without a second thought.  Once digitized that information can live forever and be shared freely among thousands of users.

Many of us have mobile phones.  Even the simplest model allows our carriers to retain the contents of most every call we make or text message we send.  Smart phones with GPSpinpoint our exact location 24/7.  

We swipe our Kroger card freely to get discounts thus allowing our buying patterns to be tracked.  Once a birth certificate is registered for your new born don’t be surprised if you see more ads for Pampers on your Facebook pages.  Browse the web to look at the new Corvette our buy lots of expensive food items and you might see more offers for trips and expensive cars in your email.

 

Gathering, storing, sorting and analyzing all of this information is made possible by our digital networked society.  Everything is connected and once a scrap of information enters this electronic labyrinth it is essentially there forever.

For sure some companies and organizations maintain strict privacy policies but the volume of public information on line is amazing.  If you want to try an experiment search for information about yourself.  Start with Google and move on to the various White Pages directories.  Don’t forget HamiltonCountyAuditor.org and the Clerk of Courts website in your county.  You will be amazed by the profile you can develop.  Where you live and what your home is worth is but a click away.  Missed a tax payment?  That bit of information is there too.

In some ways the horse has left the barn.  For most of us the convenience of having this free flow of information is now so pervasive that even if we want to, we cannot go back. So the next time you are loading an App on your iPad or smart phone and it asks you to enable the GPSlocation feature remember that it does come with a price.

Convenience Has a Price

There is no doubt that the proliferation of all things digital has provided once unbelievable conveniences in our daily lives.  Simple things like shopping or writing a letter are now made effortless with the help of computers, tablets, smart phones and other digital accoutrement.  We can ask our smart phone for directions to the closest ATM when we need cash.  Amazon not only fills our book order but makes suggestions for other reads that we might like.  Parents can keep an eye on their teenager’s comings and goings and your auto insurance company can even offer discounts if you let one of their digital recorders “ride along” with you.

I am not nor do I want others to be paranoid about big brother or big sister.  I do think that it is a good to be aware of how much information we provide to others often without a second thought.  Once digitized that information can live forever and be shared freely among thousands of users.

Many of us have mobile phones.  Even the simplest model allows our carriers to retain the contents of most every call we make or text message we send.  Smart phones with GPS pinpoint our exact location 24/7.  

We swipe our Kroger card freely to get discounts thus allowing our buying patterns to be tracked.  Once a birth certificate is registered for your new born don’t be surprised if you see more ads for Pampers on your Facebook pages.  Browse the web to look at the new Corvette our buy lots of expensive food items and you might see more offers for trips and expensive cars in your email.

 

Gathering, storing, sorting and analyzing all of this information is made possible by our digital networked society.  Everything is connected and once a scrap of information enters this electronic labyrinth it is essentially there forever.

For sure some companies and organizations maintain strict privacy policies but the volume of public information on line is amazing.  If you want to try an experiment search for information about yourself.  Start with Google and move on to the various White Pages directories.  Don’t forget HamiltonCountyAuditor.org and the Clerk of Courts website in your county.  You will be amazed by the profile you can develop.  Where you live and what your home is worth is but a click away.  Missed a tax payment?  That bit of information is there too.

In some ways the horse has left the barn.  For most of us the convenience of having this free flow of information is now so pervasive that even if we want to, we cannot go back. So the next time you are loading an App on your iPad or smart phone and it asks you to enable the GPS location feature remember that it does come with a price.

Where Everybody Knows Your Name

“Sometimes you want to go where everybody knows your name.” Many will remember that song from the 1980’s hit TV show “Cheers.” The program and the sentiments expressed in the theme song were popular well before the Internet. Today, rather than wishing that everyone knows your name, many of us are worried that there is very little about us that isn’t known by just about anyone who cares to find out. Our grocer knows what brand of soup we prefer. Our credit card company knows where we travel on business or pleasure. Our book seller knows we many not be doing climate research when we order “The Tropic of Capricorn.” In short most everything we do every place we travel, every item we purchase and even what we chose to read can now be tracked and in many cases it is.

Some of this lack of privacy is a byproduct of efficient business practices. Stores began to use computers to track inventory so when you came in to get that bottle milk and loaf of bread the shelves would be stocked. Since you were paying with a credit card, they could track your specific buying habits and begin to target you with ads for things that you might like. It wasn’t long before they figured out a way to track your purchases even if you paid by cash. So now many of us carry key rings festooned with little plastic cards with bar codes that we gladly let the check out clerk scan when we shop. The reward is a few cents off the bill or savings on the next gas fill up. The price is your privacy.

As more of us are using Facebook and other social media, the amount of very personal information about us is made readily available. It is easy to get so comfortable with social media exchanges that we might post comments or relate experiences that we would never divulge even to a most trusted friend. A good rule of thumb is never to write a post online that you would not be comfortable reading on the front page of the newspaper.

When you sign up for Facebook or other on line service, you are often invited to create a profile. You may wish to keep that information to a minimum. By entering detailed information like your birth date, hometown, workplace and other personal details you give those who may be looking at this information with other than honorable interest to begin to piece together a good base for identity theft. My advice is to keep the information shared in these profiles very sparse.

Almost daily we are asked for and freely provide small bits of information which may seem insignificant. By using the Internet and powerful computers, all these little bits collected over an extended period of time can result in a very detailed profile. Advertisers or other less honorable enterprises exploit that information… sometimes to your detriment.

In many case the horse has left the barn. There is not much we can do to get our privacy back. We can be more diligent about giving out that phone number or email address every time the clerk might ask. We should also pay close attention as our elected officials try to develop laws to control how this information is used.

If you send me your address, date of birth and mother’s maiden name, I will add you to my newsletter.

Where Everybody Knows Your Name

“Sometimes you want to go where everybody knows your name.” Many will remember that song from the 1980’s hit TV show “Cheers.” The program and the sentiments expressed in the theme song were popular well before the Internet. Today, rather than wishing that everyone knows your name, many of us are worried that there is very little about us that isn’t known by just about anyone who cares to find out. Our grocer knows what brand of soup we prefer. Our credit card company knows where we travel on business or pleasure. Our book seller knows we many not be doing climate research when we order “The Tropic of Capricorn.” In short most everything we do every place we travel, every item we purchase and even what we chose to read can now be tracked and in many cases it is.

Some of this lack of privacy is a byproduct of efficient business practices. Stores began to use computers to track inventory so when you came in to get that bottle milk and loaf of bread the shelves would be stocked. Since you were paying with a credit card, they could track your specific buying habits and begin to target you with ads for things that you might like. It wasn’t long before they figured out a way to track your purchases even if you paid by cash. So now many of us carry key rings festooned with little plastic cards with bar codes that we gladly let the check out clerk scan when we shop. The reward is a few cents off the bill or savings on the next gas fill up. The price is your privacy.

As more of us are using Facebook and other social media, the amount of very personal information about us is made readily available. It is easy to get so comfortable with social media exchanges that we might post comments or relate experiences that we would never divulge even to a most trusted friend. A good rule of thumb is never to write a post online that you would not be comfortable reading on the front page of the newspaper.

When you sign up for Facebook or other on line service, you are often invited to create a profile. You may wish to keep that information to a minimum. By entering detailed information like your birth date, hometown, workplace and other personal details you give those who may be looking at this information with other than honorable interest to begin to piece together a good base for identity theft. My advice is to keep the information shared in these profiles very sparse.

Almost daily we are asked for and freely provide small bits of information which may seem insignificant. By using the Internet and powerful computers, all these little bits collected over an extended period of time can result in a very detailed profile. Advertisers or other less honorable enterprises exploit that information… sometimes to your detriment.

In many case the horse has left the barn. There is not much we can do to get our privacy back. We can be more diligent about giving out that phone number or email address every time the clerk might ask. We should also pay close attention as our elected officials try to develop laws to control how this information is used.

If you send me your address, date of birth and mother’s maiden name, I will add you to my newsletter.

On the Internet, everybody knows you're a dog.

In July 1993 the New Yorker Magazine published a cartoon by Peter Steiner showing a dog sitting in front of a computer. The caption read, “On the Internet, nobody knows you're a dog." Oh the changes that fourteen years can make. Today, not only will they know you are a dog, they will know the color of your spots, the length of you coat and the brand of dog food you like.

Among the myriad benefits of the Internet, personal privacy remains a serious issue that has garnered much attention of late. Most recently Google® has been in the news as it has been ordered by the US courts to hand over data that contains information from every clip ever played on its popular YouTube® video sharing website. It has been reported that the data file, which has more than 12 terabytes of information, contains the IP address and viewers’ ID.

What this means is if you ever watched a video on YouTube®, that video and your identity may be able to be matched. Most likely not a problem if you were watching singing cats and dogs, perhaps problematic if you were just curious if there really was a video on how to make a nuclear bomb.

There are so many examples of how various companies and organizations both real and virtual gather, store and use information about you. Once you make your first purchase on Amazon.com®, the next time you log on you will be greeted with list of suggested books and other items. This list is developed specifically for you based on previous purchases and in some cases even casual browsing. This can be a great asset when you are looking for new books that you may have missed within a category of interest. It can also funny when you are presented with a list of pre-school classics because the last time you were on Amazon.com® you bought a gift for your grandson.

It is not only online that information about you is gathered. The discount cards that are promoted by Kroger and other grocery outlets help the company track your individual buying habits. Each item you purchase can be tracked if you use the bar coded plastic card when you check out. This way the store can target what coupons they may wish to send to you in the mail.

It is no coincidence that if you were recently online looking at convertibles that your US mail box and your email box will all of a sudden have several advertisements for new convertibles from variuous automakers..

So much of our personal information is available. Typing your phone number into the Google® serach box will most often give your address. The Hamilton County Auditor’s website http://www.hamiltoncountyauditor.org/ has information about your home, property taxes, improvements and even contains a recent photograph and block diagram of your house.
There is not much we can do to protect our personal information from being collected if we are going to continue to enjoy the benefits of modern technology. We can however insist that the use of this information is scrutinized by our leaders and that our right to privacy is protected.

On the Internet, everybody knows you're a dog.

In July 1993 the New Yorker Magazine published a cartoon by Peter Steiner showing a dog sitting in front of a computer. The caption read, “On the Internet, nobody knows you're a dog." Oh the changes that fourteen years can make. Today, not only will they know you are a dog, they will know the color of your spots, the length of you coat and the brand of dog food you like.

Among the myriad benefits of the Internet, personal privacy remains a serious issue that has garnered much attention of late. Most recently Google® has been in the news as it has been ordered by the US courts to hand over data that contains information from every clip ever played on its popular YouTube® video sharing website. It has been reported that the data file, which has more than 12 terabytes of information, contains the IP address and viewers’ ID.

What this means is if you ever watched a video on YouTube®, that video and your identity may be able to be matched. Most likely not a problem if you were watching singing cats and dogs, perhaps problematic if you were just curious if there really was a video on how to make a nuclear bomb.

There are so many examples of how various companies and organizations both real and virtual gather, store and use information about you. Once you make your first purchase on Amazon.com®, the next time you log on you will be greeted with list of suggested books and other items. This list is developed specifically for you based on previous purchases and in some cases even casual browsing. This can be a great asset when you are looking for new books that you may have missed within a category of interest. It can also funny when you are presented with a list of pre-school classics because the last time you were on Amazon.com® you bought a gift for your grandson.

It is not only online that information about you is gathered. The discount cards that are promoted by Kroger and other grocery outlets help the company track your individual buying habits. Each item you purchase can be tracked if you use the bar coded plastic card when you check out. This way the store can target what coupons they may wish to send to you in the mail.

It is no coincidence that if you were recently online looking at convertibles that your US mail box and your email box will all of a sudden have several advertisements for new convertibles from variuous automakers..

So much of our personal information is available. Typing your phone number into the Google® serach box will most often give your address. The Hamilton County Auditor’s website http://www.hamiltoncountyauditor.org/ has information about your home, property taxes, improvements and even contains a recent photograph and block diagram of your house.
There is not much we can do to protect our personal information from being collected if we are going to continue to enjoy the benefits of modern technology. We can however insist that the use of this information is scrutinized by our leaders and that our right to privacy is protected.