So news about security has been all over the place recently- and no wonder- especially as our devices begin to take over our lives (slowly but surely) and mobile everything becomes the accepted lifestyle, people naturally begin to wonder...."So what happens with all of the information that I put out there?". I think it's not debate-able that there is more information out there now than there ever was before about every single one of us, and while some people simply chalk it up to "well that's how the times are changin'...." there are definitely a whole other group of people who are getting increasingly concerned about this turn of events. Don't believe me? If you're a Google user, go ahead and head over to the Google Dashboard and check out what Google knows about you- it's legit- it was featured in BusinessWeek a few years ago. Not only are they tracking your preferences and interests, they also consolidate that the information you offer about yourself (through emails, calendars,etc.) in a "Google Dashboard" (www.google.com/dashboard).
The most recent villain in this game though seems ironic- since they also capitalize on the amount of information that they know about each of us. Facebook actually has been accused of trying to hire ghostwriters with the express intent of getting them to write negative things about Google's new search capability called "Social Circle". Supposedly, Social Circle would allow users to search for something like "Restaurants in Chicago" and be able to pull up a list of what their friends were saying related to this topic by pulling from public social media feeds such as Facebook, Yelp or LinkedIn. However, the only way this can happen is if users link Google to their social media feeds. Otherwise, your post about what you had for breakfast is safe from the prying eyes of....your friends?
Speaking of the Google blitz, Google has been quite busy recently! Not only have they recently unleashed the new "tagging" feature in Gmail, where users can "tag" certain messages to be important or not, it has also been making huge strides in expanding it's Android market storefront. They recently released a bunch of new functionalities at the annual I/O developer conference which all are supposed to improve a consumer's ability to find new apps- including revised top app charts and improvements in their "related apps" feed, which will show trending download volume, related apps by people who've downloaded a certain app, etc. And Android is certainly taking off! Currently, Android is expected to have more than 100M devices worldwide and adds 400K new activations every day. With a wide selection of 310 Android devices, it is available in 112 countries across 215 MNOs. The Android Market itself boasts 200K apps, which consumers have installed more than 4.5B times.... With numbers like these, I guess you can afford to have Facebook take a swipe at you every now and then...
Getting back to the privacy issue. Apple landed in hot water recently when there was an accusation of Apple secretly tracking its customers through the GPS devices on their cell phones. They finally issued a statement saying that they were not tracking the location of cell phones (and were never planning to) and that the only file that was located in their OS was put there to retrieve satellite data faster- cutting the load time from a few minutes to seconds. Although I have to say it wouldn't be surprising if they were tracking data, I actually believe them on this one. They have a lot of other ways to find out information about you if they really wanted- not just through the location of your cell phone...If I were Apple- I would definitely target iTunes accounts first if I wanted information. It actually got so bad that Steve Jobs himself had to start grand standing- being very clear by announcing that "We don't track anyone" (which I don't believe). I mean c'mon! If you're Apple, you're tracking somebody- you probably just figure that location data is small peanuts for what you could really do...am I right? (I think it's pretty funny to note that pretty much simultaneously as this is happening, Senators have "conveniently" began to lobby for smartphone location tracking laws.) They're not really asking for much- and this regulation can't be a surprise- the mobile industry is long overdue for some official privacy/security standards (I mean, you can use your mobile phone to find a parking spot for the love of...). Unsurprisingly, Apple and Google were called in front of the Senate panel to outline their location tracking policies in front of the law makers. This occurred just days after the FCC announced that it would host a consumer forum on mobile location data (can we just call this the Apple syndrome and get it over with?).
In a statement the FCC said, "Over the last few years, [location-based services] have become an important part of the mobile market and a boon to the economy. Commercial location-based services include applications that help consumers find the lowest priced product nearby or the nearest restaurant...But recent reports have raised concerns about the location-based information that is gathered when consumers use mobile devices.
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