Re: [Air-l] Google scares me again
This strikes me also as being analogous to all-in-one ID cards (e.g. campus IDs or various proposals for national ID cards) - where once a person's records were held in discrete offices and therefore much more difficult to collate for profiling or investigative purposes, now there is handy access to the whole package through linked records. Who is it convenient for? Jericho -- Michael Zimmer <michael.zimmer@nyu.edu> wrote: Hi Ellis - Well, it is convenient when my grocer tracks my purchases through my frequent shopper card so I can count on certain items remaining in stock (assuming I'm not the only one buying them). And perhaps it is helpful for Google to provide an advertisement for digital cameras if I search for "Olympus Stylus". That's using particular bits of my activities in order to taylor a particular service to me. But it's a difference in kind when my activities that were previously dispersed across various products, services, and locations can be tracked an aggregated into a single source. And it's also a difference in kind when that information is processed in order to create some kind of psychological profile of what kind of a person I am (not just what beer I buy or what I happen to be searching for that day). Who knows what kind of decisions might be made based on such an attempt to profile my psyche. (I'm thinking of issues raised in: Bowker & Star's "Sorting Things Out: Classification and its Consequences", Gandy's "The Panoptic Sort: A Political Economy of Personal Information," and Lyon's "Surveillance as Social Sorting: Privacy, Risk, and Digital Discrimination" ) And I have yet to see any documentation from companies such as Google outlining precisely what information about me they collect, how it might be aggregated across their products & services, and what kind of processing they perform with said data, and with whom it has been shared with. The typical "privacy policy" is purposefully vague on such details. -mz ----- Michael Zimmer, PhD Microsoft Fellow, Information Society Project, Yale Law School e: michael.zimmer@nyu.edu w: http://michaelzimmer.org On Jul 10, 2007, at 3:00 PM, Ellis Godard wrote:
Perhaps I'm new-fashioned, but I like targeted communications based on mined data. There's always been tracking, capturing, aggregating, and profiling - it's just getting better executed, and somewhat better documented, each of which is arguably a boon. -e
-----Original Message----- From: air-l-bounces@listserv.aoir.org [mailto:air-l- bounces@listserv.aoir.org] On Behalf Of Michael Zimmer Sent: Monday, July 09, 2007 6:40 PM To: air-l@listserv.aoir.org Subject: Re: [Air-l] Google scares me again
Perhaps I'm old fashioned, but I think psychological profiling of users based online habits is a tad more problematic than just "somewhat" of an ethical minefield.
Microsoft recently announced their hopes to do something similar: http://michaelzimmer.org/2007/05/23/msft-wants-to-identify-all-web- surfers-based-on-surfing-habits/
One wonders if any part of one's earthly existence will remain untouched by those wanting to track, capture, aggregate, and profile...
-mz
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It is convenient for me when I want to find something or be found by someone. It is inconvenient as hell when I want to hide something or not be found by someone. Privacy is no longer a naturally occurring condition. Anyone can find out anything now. We all have privacy now only to the extent that some of the things that anyone can do are illegal and these laws are enforced. --- "jerichob@juno.com" <jerichob@juno.com> wrote:
This strikes me also as being analogous to all-in-one ID cards (e.g. campus IDs or various proposals for national ID cards) - where once a person's records were held in discrete offices and therefore much more difficult to collate for profiling or investigative purposes, now there is handy access to the whole package through linked records. Who is it convenient for?
Jericho
-- Michael Zimmer <michael.zimmer@nyu.edu> wrote: Hi Ellis -
Well, it is convenient when my grocer tracks my purchases through my frequent shopper card so I can count on certain items remaining in stock (assuming I'm not the only one buying them). And perhaps it is helpful for Google to provide an advertisement for digital cameras if I search for "Olympus Stylus". That's using particular bits of my activities in order to taylor a particular service to me.
But it's a difference in kind when my activities that were previously dispersed across various products, services, and locations can be tracked an aggregated into a single source. And it's also a difference in kind when that information is processed in order to create some kind of psychological profile of what kind of a person I am (not just what beer I buy or what I happen to be searching for that day). Who knows what kind of decisions might be made based on such an attempt to profile my psyche. (I'm thinking of issues raised in: Bowker & Star's "Sorting Things Out: Classification and its Consequences", Gandy's "The Panoptic Sort: A Political Economy of Personal Information," and Lyon's "Surveillance as Social Sorting: Privacy, Risk, and Digital Discrimination" )
And I have yet to see any documentation from companies such as Google outlining precisely what information about me they collect, how it might be aggregated across their products & services, and what kind of processing they perform with said data, and with whom it has been shared with. The typical "privacy policy" is purposefully vague on such details.
-mz
----- Michael Zimmer, PhD Microsoft Fellow, Information Society Project, Yale Law School e: michael.zimmer@nyu.edu w: http://michaelzimmer.org
On Jul 10, 2007, at 3:00 PM, Ellis Godard wrote:
Perhaps I'm new-fashioned, but I like targeted communications based on mined data. There's always been tracking, capturing, aggregating, and profiling - it's just getting better executed, and somewhat better documented, each of which is arguably a boon. -e
-----Original Message----- From: air-l-bounces@listserv.aoir.org [mailto:air-l- bounces@listserv.aoir.org] On Behalf Of Michael Zimmer Sent: Monday, July 09, 2007 6:40 PM To: air-l@listserv.aoir.org Subject: Re: [Air-l] Google scares me again
Perhaps I'm old fashioned, but I think psychological profiling of users based online habits is a tad more problematic than just "somewhat" of an ethical minefield.
Microsoft recently announced their hopes to do something similar:
http://michaelzimmer.org/2007/05/23/msft-wants-to-identify-all-web-
surfers-based-on-surfing-habits/
One wonders if any part of one's earthly existence will remain untouched by those wanting to track, capture, aggregate, and profile...
-mz
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Join the Association of Internet Researchers: http://www.aoir.org/
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Join the Association of Internet Researchers: http://www.aoir.org/
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"The camera introduces us to unconscious optics as does psychoanalysis to unconscious impulses." - Walter Benjamin ____________________________________________________________________________________ Park yourself in front of a world of choices in alternative vehicles. Visit the Yahoo! Auto Green Center. http://autos.yahoo.com/green_center/
Privacy is not the same as secrecy, and is not free. See Steven Nock's "The Cost of Privacy" - We're not willing to pay the costs for all instances of it. -e
-----Original Message----- From: air-l-bounces@listserv.aoir.org [mailto:air-l- bounces@listserv.aoir.org] On Behalf Of Dr. T. Michael Roberts Sent: Wednesday, July 11, 2007 9:28 AM To: air-l@listserv.aoir.org Subject: Re: [Air-l] Google scares me again
It is convenient for me when I want to find something or be found by someone. It is inconvenient as hell when I want to hide something or not be found by someone. Privacy is no longer a naturally occurring condition. Anyone can find out anything now. We all have privacy now only to the extent that some of the things that anyone can do are illegal and these laws are enforced.
participants (3)
-
Dr. T. Michael Roberts -
Ellis Godard -
jerichob＠juno.com