The White House recently announced a new initiative to develop a trusted identity ecosystem on the web called the National Strategy for Trusted Identities in Cyberspace (NSTIC). Per Ars Technica, “The basic idea behind the proposal is the creation of a trusted “Identity Ecosystem,” where users, businesses, and the government can voluntarily carry out transactions secure in the knowledge that everyone is who they say they are, and where users don’t have to give up any more information than is necessary to complete a transaction.”
Interestingly, the system might more easily allow for anonymous blogging, presumably as long as the content isn’t important to the government itself.
The Holy Grail for social media companies is to figure out a way to sort through the trillions of messages, status updates, “Likes,” and countless other social interactions to find a clear pattern of user behavior. According to a recent article in GigaOm, the solution to this problem may lie in the world of cloud computing.
On the heels of news that location-based social networking website Foursquare has closed a $20 million round of new funding, Wired has the story of how one white hat hacker logged the check-in data for 875 thousand users via a Foursquare security hole. Foursquare resolved the issue by making a minor change to its privacy settings, but the coder who discovered the hole, Jesper Anderson, isn’t satisfied that it’s a practical solution for users who want to maintain their privacy.
Yesterday morning, I shared a news item about how divorce attorneys love using social media in the court room. Yesterday evening, MSNBC’s Helen A.S. Popkin weighed in on the issue, offering her typically incisive and witty commentary. Popkin argues that too many people misplace blame on social networking websites when its really the users who are responsible for their behavior online.
She says, “Social networks don’t destroy jobs and families, people do. Or they don’t. It’s your free will.” It’s a fair point, and one that gets missed sometimes in the mainstream media.
Mashable is celebrating “Social Media Day” with social media events and gatherings across the country. Check out Mashable’s blog post to see a message from Mashable CEO Pete Cashmore about the festivities and learn where a party might be happening near you.
In today’s Quick Hits we talk about Google’s secret social network, why Facebook has helped divorce attorneys, and how many social networking websites are giving up info about users’ locations.
A former Facebook CTO recently confirmed that rival company Google is developing a major social networking website based off of the Facebook user experience. Called Google Me, the project would be Google’s third attempt at a social networking site, behind Buzz, Wave, and Orkut. For what it’s worth, here’s Michael Arrington’s opinion on Google Me and why he believes Google should create a straight-up clone of Facebook.
Divorce lawyers love social media. According to an AP report, “The American Academy of Matrimonial Lawyers says 81 percent of its members have used or faced evidence plucked from Facebook, MySpace, Twitter and other social networking sites, including YouTube and LinkedIn, over the last five years.” A whopping 66% of the lawyers singled out Facebook as the main source for uncovering important information, from a spouse’s infidelities to visual proof of a parent’s alcohol or drug abuse.
Denver divorce attorney Leslie Matthews says it best when she explains, “You’re finding information that you just never get in the normal discovery process — ever. People are just blabbing things all over Facebook. People don’t yet quite connect what they’re saying in their divorce cases is completely different from what they’re saying on Facebook. It doesn’t even occur to them that they’d be found out.”
In this week’s edition of The Business podcast, co-produced by UK newspapers The Guardian and The Observer, journalist Aditya Chakrabortty, author Clay Shirky, Guardian columnist Julian Glover, blogger Evgeny Morozov, Guardian business editor Dan Roberts, and author David Kirkpatrick discuss how the Internet has changed consumer behavior and transformed business.
In a column for the Kansas City Star, Aisha Sultan explains why she had to deactivate Facebook (and why she had to come back five days later). The column touches on the many reasons why Facebook has become such a popular destination, namely the way that it reinforces loose relationships and serves as a central hub for sharing information online. The column also features insight from attorney Craig Moore on some of the legal issues that Facebook users have faced as a result of their social networking addiction.
Whether you know it or not, your social networking websites might be giving up your location. According to a ComputerWorld article, “A study out this week from Worcester Polytechnic Institute (WPI) in Massachusetts shows that mobile social networks are giving data about users’ physical locations to tracking sites and other social networking services. Researchers reported that all 20 sites that were studied leaked some kind of private information to third-party tracking sites.” Some of the sites in the study included Facebook, LinkedIn, MySpace, and Twitter.
Yesterday, Jan Hoffman wrote an incisive and sprawling article on cyberbullying for the New York Times. The article focuses on the various difficulties school officials face in determining the proper punishment for cyberbullying, particularly if the harassment occurs off of school property. It also features a number of specific examples of cyberbullying in schools and the pain that each event caused its victims.
In a special column to CNN, social media researcher and privacy activist Danah Boyd explains why Facebook’s real privacy problem isn’t its complicated privacy settings, which it has improved, but rather the company’s continued inability to foster a culture of “trust and informed consent.” As Boyd explains, Facebook’s current model does not respect user’s rights.
“Changing things and then forcing users to opt out is manipulative. Instead, they should be seeking informed consent — actively working with users to help make sure that they understand what’s at stake in their choices. It is unacceptable for a company like Facebook to trick people into ‘consenting’ to make their data more visible than they might think that it is.”
Scott Duke Harris at the Mercury News has an interesting story on Internet manners and the way that Facebook and other social networking websites have changed the way people think about sharing information. Harris mainly focuses on the “TMI” dilemma, whereby people knowingly (or unknowingly) share too much information online, leading to embarrassment later.
The article offers one very interesting example for how TMI plays out on Facebook. One user posted this message as a public status update: “This goes out to any girl that ive ever been with. I got tested today for Herpes and i came out positive.”
Washington Post blogger David Weigel was forced to resign this past week after disparaging remarks he made about conservative politicians were made public. The catch, the remarks were posted on a on a private e-mail list for Washington D.C. journalists called Journolist. Of course, they weren’t really private at all, which is why Ezra Klein (the famed political blogger who started the list) decided to shut it down after Weigel’s resignation.
In a separate column discussing the situation, Klein wrote “insofar as the current version of Journolist has seen its archives become a weapon, and insofar as people’s careers are now at stake, it has to die.”
Marshall Kirkpatrick at ReadWriteWeb has an interesting and well-written op-ed explaining why some people, including himself, use location-based social networking websites such as Gowalla and Foursquare. If you’ve ever wondered why someone would willingly share their precise global coordinates with friends — and sometimes strangers — Kirkpatrick’s article may answer your question.
Lastly, Rob Cottingham of the popular web comic Noise to Signal takes a funny look at the viciousness of some Internet commenters. Cottingham suggests that “civil behaviour ought to be the expected norm of online community, not the welcome exception.” We can definitely agree with that.
Reputation.com CEO Michael Fertik and ReptuationDefender Chief Privacy Officer David Thompson, together co-authors of the best-selling new book Wild West 2.0: How to Protect and Restore Your Reputation on the Untamed Social Frontier, have been all over the country talking about ways that individuals and businesses can proactively protect their online reputations. Check out our update on where Fertik and Thompson have been spreading the good word.
Recently, David Thompson appeared as a guest on privacy advocate Katherine Albrecht’s radio show. Broadcasting live from the floor of the Computer Freedom and Privacy Conference,. Albrecht and Thompson discussed Wild West 2.0 and why it is so important for individuals to manage their digital data in the modern Internet age. To download the interview, follow this link. Thompson’s interview appears in the second hour of the program.
While at the CFP Conference, David Thompson also had the opportunity to chat with Sheila Dean for her Beat the Chip podcast. In addition to talking about the conference, Thompson shared insight into Wild West 2.0 and why personal online reputation management is a fast-growing field. To listen to the half-hour podcast, follow this link.
Next Monday, David Thompson will appear as a guest at the Identity Technology conference in Washington D.C.
Yesterday, Michael Fertik traveled to Microsoft headquarters in Redmond, Washington to discuss online reputation management and Internet privacy issues. Last December, Microsoft sponsored some of the most compelling research yet into online reputation management with one study showing that “79 percent of United States hiring managers and job recruiters surveyed reviewed online information about job applicants.”
On June 17th, Michael Fertik appeared as a guest on the award-winning online radio program, A Closer Look with Pam Atherton. The interview, which you can listen to here, touches on current Internet law and how there is little legal recourse for individuals who have been slandered online. Fertik also touched on how the privacy policies of many websites are inconsistent or, worse yet, change over time to provide less protection for users.
Last weekend, Michael Fertik appeared as a guest on FOX & Friends where he discussed Internet privacy and how insurance companies and other organizations are using the web and social media tools to learn about customers. Check out a clip from Michael’s appearance below.
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Wild West 2.0 is already going into a second printing, so if you haven’t picked up your copy yet, there’s still time. Just head over to Amazon.com and order your copy today. Wild West 2.0 can also be purchased at Barnes & Noble and at Borders. A Kindle version of the book will be out soon.
In today’s Quick Hits, we talk about Twitter’s recent legal problems, how Internet companies could have more loyal users if they gave them greater control over their data, and a new proposal from the Obama administration that is sure to face criticism.
Several technology CEOs recently sat down together at GigaOM’s Structure 2010 conference to discuss data privacy. The conversation drifted toward a need to give customers control over removal of their data. They make a comparison to a bank. Customers put their money (data) in because it’s a safe place. If they weren’t sure they could get their money (data) out, they wouldn’t use the bank.
There’s a lot of wild pictures on Facebook, but it might be hard to top the picture that one Florida woman recently shared online: a an image of her 11-month-old baby appearing to smoke a bong. Child protection authorities were notified of the image and are investigating the case.
When Facebook launched its Instant Personalization Program, one of the companies it partnered with was the Internet radio player Pandora. In an interview with the Wall Street Journal, Pandora CEO Tim Westergren discusses how Pandora users reacted to the Instant Personalization Program and why he believes finding the balance between privacy and advertising is an important issue.
According to the Wall Street Journal, “The Federal Trade Commission said social-networking company Twitter Inc. settled charges that it deceived consumers and put their privacy at risk by failing to safeguard personal information. The FTC filed complaints against Twitter, alleging ‘serious lapses’ in the company’s data security led to hackers last year obtaining access to administrative controls. That allowed hackers to access tweets that users had designated private, and allowed the intruders to send out phony tweets from accounts including one belonging to President Barack Obama.”
According to an article in InformationWeek, “The Obama administration is set to propose a new system for authenticating people, organizations and infrastructure on the Web. The online authentication and identity management system would be targeted at the transactional level — for example, when someone logs into their banking website or completes an online e-commerce purchase.”
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