Category Archives: Advertising
Do You Know Who Your iPhone’s Been Calling?
Privacy policies are largely garbage from an end-user perspective. API developers need to adopt ethics of privacy, instil it throughout their code, and cut off those who abusing the API in manners that clearly violate both the terms and aims of the privacy ethic and policy. APIs should be run past privacy-minded technologists prior to being rolled out, and be modified where it is clear that the API permits and encourages invasive surveillance without the end-user’s consent. Ideally we’d see mass opt-in requirements for this kind of surveillance but I fear that this is unlikely, at least in the short term. Developing an ethic of privacy, combined with accessible three-layer privacy policies, might at least keep application and API developers honest at best, and give grounds for suit in front of the FTC, OPC, and EU Commission at worst. Continue reading
Update: Feeva, Advertising, and Privacy
d. Feeva’s adoption of privacy as a cornerstone of their business indicates a (rare) success for privacy advocates who have advocated for stronger privacy protections online; whether you agree with the success resting on the technology (where I think a success can be read), at the very least least it should be agreed that baking privacy into Feeva’s advertising-based business model is a success. Continue reading
Packet Headers and Privacy
Juniper’s proposal may see ISPs leverage their existing customer service information to modify customers’ data traffic for the purposes of enhancing the geographic relevance of online advertising. This poses a severe problem for citizens’ locational and communicative privacy. Continue reading
Apple and Locational Data Sharing
It seems that the hint of advertising dollars has led Apple to set aside privacy principles in the hopes of making a quick buck at the expense of citizens’ privacy. While not necessarily surprising or even disappointing (Apple is, after all, a publicly traded company that is purely motivated to return profits to their shareholders) the high-profile company’s bait and switch on its privacy principles will hopefully attract regulatory attention and establish more ‘guidance’ so that other companies are less willing to sell out customers on behalf of the balance sheet. Continue reading
