The Net was not designed for privacy. When you surf the web, send
email, chat, and post to newsgroups, your computer leaves behind a digital footprint
called an IP address. Footprints in the real world fade with time, but in Cyberspace, your
IP address is recorded permanently. Even if you provide false information to website
registration forms, your personal information can easily be tracked down. Remember, the
Internet was designed for computers to exchange information, not hide it.
Your life is an open book. Internet traffic, such as email messages, are just
like postcards. Anyone who intercepts them discover who you're talking to and what you're
saying. Live chat and password-protected websites also give the illusion of anonymity, but
your IP address is still recorded alongside your chat transcripts and stored in company
database logs. You can never take back what you say online.
You are the target (market). Marketers want to know as much as they can about
you, and the Internet is the perfect tool for compiling detailed personal profiles.
Increasingly sophisticated profiling technology has emerged to harvest as much personal
information as possible from the Net. Your name, address, employer, salary, marital
status, religion, hobbies… it's all collected and placed in a growing profile with your
name on it. If you think this sounds far-fetched, think again. This kind of
surveillance is happening now.
So what if they eavesdrop? You're a good person with nothing to hide, so why
should you care if your personal information and communications are vulnerable? Lots of
reasons. Beyond the annoyance of being bombarded with marketing messages, your profile
can be used to discriminate, harass, or even perpetrate crimes against you and your
family.
Who can you trust? Many companies take advantage of consumer concern for online
privacy by providing so-called "identity and relationship management" services.
They ask you to fill out forms with ALL your personal information, and then hand out
pieces of it to partner merchant sites. Merchant sites themselves post privacy policies
they can't or won't enforce when push comes to shove. And others still leave personal
information in poorly secured databases, vulnerable to hacker attacks. This is the
opposite of privacy.
