Ramanisblog

Tag: privacy

  • Facebook shares your Information with Strangers?

    Facebook logo
    Image via Wikipedia

     

    Social-networking sites at times are very useful.

    But the dangers they pose out weigh the services.

    Please read blogs under internet.

    But how much of that is Facebook sharing with the whole world? How long does it stick around? And is there any way to block some of it?

    People were learning too much

    Honi Hertsenberg of Cincinnati has become a Facebook expert over the past two years, after a few scary experiences. She discovered that people she didn’t know were learning too much about her personal life and about her children.

    “If you are the type of person who uploads pictures and posts personal information, you will be out there for anyone to see,” said Hertsenberg.

    Default means sharing

    We sat down with the Western Hills woman at Diane’s Restaurant on Anderson Ferry Road. She says the problem is that if you don’t change Facebook’s basic settings, it is sharing everything about you — where you live, where you went to school, your family, your kids — with 600 million other members around the world.

    “The default settings are set so that anyone who searches for you page is going to see your personal information,” said Hertsenberg.

    Example: Someone posted a photo of a party from 20 years ago, “tagging” a much younger Honi drinking beer in a very casual outfit. That is hardly what she wants employers to see.

    First stop: Privacy page

    So unlike many members, Hertsenberg decided to spend some time on Facebook’s privacy page. She learned it’s not hard to set up two different profiles: One for just your closest friends and family, and one for everyone else.

    “I have lists of actual friends. I have lists that are family. So I can pick and choose what each group actually sees,” she explained.

    So how can you protect yourself and your loved ones?

    * Go to Facebook’s privacy page.
    * Set it so that only “friends” can see what you post.
    * If you’re concerned about your name popping up in other people’s photos, customize it so only you can see tagging.

    Beware who you friend

    Some important friend alerts:

    * Hertsenberg says beware who you friend. They say a lot about your character.
    * Beer guzzling or political fringe friends suggest that you may share the same interests.
    * And make sure you are not sharing everything with “friends of friends”. You don’t know them.

    Watch those wall postings

    Are your friends posting embarrassing posts on your wall? You can turn that off too. “You can set it so friends cannot post to your wall,” added Hertsenberg.

    While we’re setting limits, she says be sure to make your contact info — like your addresses and cell phone number — private.

    Finally, use caution on how many businesses you “like.” When you like them, you become a free billboard for them….and you’re not getting paid for it.

    So next time you’re wasting time at work surfing Facebook, take a few minutes and visit your settings. Find out who can see what about you.

    Click here for a privacy tutorial, with detailed pictures explaining each step, courtesy the site ” All Facebook.com.”

    So clean up your profile, so you stay safe and you don’t waste your money.

    http://www.wptv.com/dpp/news/local_news/special_reports/what-is-facebook-sharing-about-you%3F

    Related:

    Facebook wants you to believe that you gave them your mobile phone number for security reasons and important notifications. The truth is that they wanted your phone number and your address to be able to share it more.

    The Huffington Post reports that Facebook is going to make your address and phone number available to “application developers”. Privacy and security experts are confident that sharing this information will expose users to greater risk of being scammed.

    According to Facebook users will be alerted if an application is requesting access to their phone number and address, but if you trust Facebook then look here to see what Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg thinks about you.

    http://blog.eset.com/2011/03/01/facebook-privacy-%25E2%2580%2593-not-even-an-electron-microscope-can-find-it

     

     

     

     

  • Radia ,Tata has no claim to privacy.

    Radia ‘s and Tata’s  claim to privacy does not hold water as their words involve policy making, attempt to bribe(refer perambalur Hospital equipment),controlling news, controlling media Funds and general disregard for Democracy in as much as they seem to manipulate Governmental policies,they , who have not been elected by people.

    The sheen of sleepless night of Tata on hearing about is lost when one hears about him in the tapes as well as his donation to Raja’s Constituency.

    As to Radia less said ,the better.

    Ordering IAS Officers, manipulating media, influencing policy decisions and brazen attempt to fix a price for every thing.

    rivacy is a right for private persons and also for private affairs of public persons. It is illogical and unreasonable for public persons to claim privacy for their public activities such as governance, policy making, industry, corporation, formation of ministry and politics. Privacy should not be mistaken with secret business operations causing harm to public institutions. Once a crime is committed, the suspicious persons need to be interrogated or investigated. Those suspected or involved cannot claim privacy and ask for protection of their identity, criminal secrets as privacy as part of right to life.

    Secret lobbying behind 2G spectrum corruption has to be probed into. Looking into authorized recorded tapes is a required and legitimate process, particularly if it involves the conversation of big people with political lobbyists, which insist on somebody to be made or not to be made the Telcom minister. If these tapes are blocked, the rich and powerful brokers would get emboldened to adjust the deals to escape from the long hands of law. Right to privacy is not secrecy or facility for hiding unethical deals and cornering state wealth through manipulations. If criminals or suspects seek this right no crime could be probed anywhere in the world.

    If Mr Ratan Tata, Ms Barkha Dutt, Mr Vir Singhvi and others who figured in Radia tapes and Ms Niira Radia herself feel defamed by these revelations, they can test their right to reputation by suing the publishers. Certainly they do not have Article 21 protection here. That right is available for victims of crime but not to criminals or their helpers.

    Privacy is an undefined right implied in Right to Life in general. It means the right to be let alone and its object is to protect inviolate personality. It can be regarded as a fundamental human right as the presumption that individuals should have an area of autonomous development, interaction and liberty, a “private sphere” with or without interaction with others and free from State intervention and free from excessive unsolicited intervention by other uninvited individuals. [1]

    Right to Information trumps Privacy

    Take a recent case in the UK where the media’s right to publish certain matters like names of accused was upheld in the general interests of public. Under the UK Human Rights Act 1998, Article 8.1 requires public authorities, including the court, to respect private and family life. Three claimants (brothers) were designated under the Terrorism (United Nations Measures) Order (SI 2006 No 2657) as persons whom the Treasury suspected of actually or potentially facilitating terrorist acts. Asset-freezing orders were made against these claimants. As other appellate courts confirmed these orders, the case reached Supreme Court, where it was held that the general public interest in publishing a report of the proceedings in which they were named was justified curtailing their rights to private life.

    A report on a study [2] on the interface between public interest, media and privacy for BBC and other State Commissions of UK concluded with a suggestion of  treating public interest as an exception to privacy: The general public put great value and importance on media information or coverage which promotes the general good, for the well-being of all. These include the identification of wrongdoing and of the wrongdoers themselves, with the media acting as guardians of shared moral and social norms. Under these conditions, and with suitable regard to the relative severity of the individual case, individuals’ privacy can be intruded upon – in extreme cases it should be – in the name of the greater good. [3]

    http://www.outlookindia.com/article.aspx?269664

  • Psychological Tests for Employment-Intrusion into Privacy?

    Psychological Tests are , at best , an educated guess work and no final word has been spoken on the veracity of the results obtained through these tests.They, right from early Stanford Test, are being constantly updated and the methodology adopted is open to question.They ignore ethnic,cultural backgrounds and the selection criteria of control group is also questionable.Also the factor of Heredity in behavior is not yet ascertained.You may read more on this in my blog filed under Psychological Tests.

    A new book shows the power corporations wield over their employees has gone too far. It’s time to take action.
    Editor’s Note: The following is an excerpt from Can They Do That? Retaking Our Fundamental Rights in the Workplace. An AlterNet review of the book by Liliana Segura follows the excerpt.

    Sibi Soroka was shocked. He had applied for a job as a security guard at the local Target to provide some steady income while he pursued his career as an actor. At the end of the process, he was required to take the Minnesota Multiphasic Personality Inventory, a psychological test used by many employers. The tests included questions about his sex life, religious beliefs, intimate feelings about family members, and even his bathroom habits.

    “I couldn’t believe anyone would ask me such personal questions,” Soroka said. “These are questions you wouldn’t even answer for your own mother, let alone some personnel director at a company.” The more he thought about it the more upset he became. When the company called him to offer him the job, he told them to find somebody else; he didn’t want to work for a company that treated people this way.

    Soroka is not alone. An estimated 15 million Americans are required to take the MMPI every year, including two million people who are required to take it as part of applying for a job. Applicants who are forced to take the test range from doctors and priests to retail sales clerks. The test has been translated into 115 different languages, including Hmong, Turkish, and even sign language. The MMPI is only one of many psychological tests used by employers, According to the American Management Association, over 40 percent of employers nationwide use psychological tests, including eighty-nine of the Fortune 100.
    http://www.alternet.org/story/145035/can_they_do_that_how_you_get_screwed_at_work

  • Google Talks Transparency, But Hides Surveillance Stats

    Google likes to trumpet transparency and free expression, especially when it concerns the internet, part of its commitment to the corporate motto, “Don’t Be Evil.”

    But despite the company’s recent online public policy posts espousing unfettered online expression, we aren’t buying it.

    The Mountain View, California, search and advertising giant said Wednesday, for example, that it was a “company that believes deeply in free expression” and that it was “determined to continue to do our part and make new, significant contributions to promote free expression in 2010.”

    But juxtapose those and other recent statements on its public policy blog with the real facts — facts that Google won’t cough up.

    We asked Google some simple questions about how much user data it turns over to the government. These are questions at the heart of free expression, especially with a company that wants you to use its operating system, its browser, its DNS servers, its search service and its e-mail and phonecalling programs.

    Google, however, declined to address the question adequately.

    Here’s Google’s answer, as provided by spokesman Brian Richardson:

    We don’t talk about types or numbers of requests to help protect all our users. Obviously, we follow the law like any other company. When we receive a subpoena or court order, we check to see if it meets both the letter and the spirit of the law before complying. And if it doesn’t we can object or ask that the request is narrowed. We have a track record of advocating on behalf of our users.

    What is Google hiding? Are the numbers so big that Google might be seen as an agent of the government, or that people might rethink the wisdom of filling up 7 GB of free e-mail space?

    These are questions we’ve been asking of Google since 2006, when it launched its five-point plan to deal with censorship in China.

    To be fair, no other tech company and no ISP publishes this data, either.

    But there’s certainly no law against it. Google prides itself on doing brave and innovative things that other companies wouldn’t even consider doing, just because it’s the right thing to do.

    But instead, Google has chosen to side with the rest of the industry and refuse, on principle, to be open with their customers. That makes us think Google agrees with some peers that suggest that the public simply can’t handle the truth.

    Verizon, for example, recently told the government it might “confuse” the public if it released how much it charged the government to assist in collecting user data via pen register/trap-and-trace orders and wiretaps.

    Yahoo said its pricing structure amounted to “confidential commercial information” and would “shock” consumers.

    Verizon made its statements as it objected to a Freedom of Information Act request from graduate student Christopher Sogohian seeking its price sheet, and said the company receives “tens of thousands” of requests annually from law enforcement agencies for customer records and information.

    Verizon did not intend for that number to be made public. It announced the figure in a letter to the government that became public last week through a follow-up FOIA request by Soghoian.

    Sogohian’s intention was to combine the price sheets, with government data on how much it spent on getting phone and net records, to figure out how many requests the feds sent per year.

    We suspect, not unreasonably, that Google also receives “tens of thousands” of law enforcement and other requests each year for data — with most of them being lawful.

    But we don’t have any sense of how often the government or others go on a wide-open fishing expeditions.

    Google knows, but it’s not telling.

    We don’t know how many subpoenas Google turned away; how many sought search records; and how many came in civil cases, such as a divorce where an unhappy husband wanted to see what’s in his soon-to-be ex-wife’s Gmail account.

    Google defends its policy, saying it has a history of fighting for privacy. It uses the example of its successful court fight to keep bulk search records from the feds.

    What’s more, Google has belatedly become a leader in online advertising privacy, giving users the chance to see what the company’s behavioral advertising algorithms think of them, to delete categories and opt out entirely. In fact, Yahoo liked the idea enough to launch its own version just weeks ago.

    And Google on Wednesday deplored that an increasing number of governments are restricting access to information online, such as China blocking sites that could be viewed as anti-government. Google also applauded this week a bill that would force the State Department to include more information in its human rights reports.

    That’s laudable.

    Yet Google retains information, and refuses to share data that could shed a bright light over how much the government and others potentially tread on online privacy.

    Google has the chance to walk its talk, and set a standard — as it has so many times before — for the rest of the internet to follow.

    If it doesn’t, shouldn’t the company think twice about trumpeting transparency, when it won’t come clean with its own users?
    http://www.wired.com/threatlevel/2009/12/google-talks-out-its-portal/?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed:+wired/index+(Wired:+Index+3+(Top+Stories+2))

  • Court to review employer access to worker messages

    Even if the court decides in favor of the employees, the Employers can still get the transcript from the service providers for a fee. Please read my blog on this for details.
    There is no privacy in the Cyber world or mobile phones.
    Coming to the specific issue the employer has every right to call for details as the mails are from the company’s account.
    WASHINGTON — The Supreme Court said Monday it will decide how much privacy workers have when they send text messages from company accounts.

    The justices said they will review a federal appeals court ruling that sided with Ontario, Calif., police officers who complained that the department improperly snooped on their electronic exchanges. The 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in San Francisco also faulted the text-messaging service for turning over transcripts of the messages without the officers’ consent.

    Users of text-messaging services “have a reasonable expectation of privacy” regarding messages stored on the service provider’s network, 9th Circuit Judge Kim Wardlaw said. Both the city and USA Mobility Wireless, Inc., which bought the text-messaging service involved in the case, appealed the 9th Circuit ruling.

    The justices turned down the company’s appeal, but said they would hear arguments in the spring in the city’s case.

    The appeals court ruling came in a lawsuit filed by Ontario police Sgt. Jeff Quon and three others after Arch Wireless gave their department transcripts of Quon’s text messages in 2002. Police officials read the messages to determine whether department-issued pagers were being used solely for work purposes.

    The city said it discovered that Quon sent and received hundreds of personal messages, including many that were sexually explicit.

    Quon and the others said the police force had an informal policy of not monitoring the usage as long as employees paid for messages in excess of monthly character limits.

    The case is City of Ontario v. Quon, 08-1332.
    http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/12/14/AR2009121401215.html?hpid=topnews