Journal Assignment.
Privacy and Security - Preventing Theft is Just the Tip of the Iceberg.
The Internet has grown far beyond it 's humble academic beginnings, and become a worldwide tool used by 30% of the worlds population. As in it 's infancy, it is still largely free, and is used for viewing entertainment, socializing, research, and commerce. The benefits are many but there is also a much darker side to the story. As part of all the on-line activities large amounts of personal and behavioral data are being generated and stored. This data, or big data as it is called, is very valuable to many business who use it to identify customers and targeting their ads. Some people worry about thieves using this data for criminal activity, but …show more content…
Employment and Analytics: Here is a particularly egregious and invasive use of big data. With the cost of health care rising, many employers are looking for ways to promote healthier lifestyles and penalize bad ones. By turning to data analytics they can evaluate their employees against the profile of healthy people. We aren 't talking about blood pressure and lean body mass here. We are talking about social media use, restaurants visited, and things purchased (Silverman, 2016). All these results could also be used to filter potential employees for medical reasons.
3. Credit score: Here is a strange and disturbing use of profiling. It seems that your credit score is a better predictor of your future driving habits than your actual driving record. Many car insurance companies are now using that score to determine your premiums (Federal Trade Commission, (2013).
4. Big Brother: Recently China has begun experimenting with a new form of social engineering using social credit scoring system. If a citizen behaves in a way deemed socially acceptable their score can go up. If they are critical of the government, like posting a comment on Ti-amen Square, their score will go down. Even the scores of the people you associate with will affect you. These scores will effect availability of travel visas, interest rates on loans, where you can work, and ultimately who will associate with you. This is a particularly clever and insidious form of Orwellian control. It is the people around …show more content…
Under the current system, there is no option to opt out and still lead a normal life. You don 't own your own data and any truly private information derived through analytics is available on-line for a price (regardless of how private or inaccurate it is). The issues of social control are also very disturbing. I have no answers to these issues. It seems that no one out there really cares. At least they don 't care enough to give up free operating systems, free emails, free search engines or free social media sites. There is an old saying “There is nothing more expensive than something that is
Privacy and Security - Preventing Theft is Just the Tip of the Iceberg.
The Internet has grown far beyond it 's humble academic beginnings, and become a worldwide tool used by 30% of the worlds population. As in it 's infancy, it is still largely free, and is used for viewing entertainment, socializing, research, and commerce. The benefits are many but there is also a much darker side to the story. As part of all the on-line activities large amounts of personal and behavioral data are being generated and stored. This data, or big data as it is called, is very valuable to many business who use it to identify customers and targeting their ads. Some people worry about thieves using this data for criminal activity, but …show more content…
Employment and Analytics: Here is a particularly egregious and invasive use of big data. With the cost of health care rising, many employers are looking for ways to promote healthier lifestyles and penalize bad ones. By turning to data analytics they can evaluate their employees against the profile of healthy people. We aren 't talking about blood pressure and lean body mass here. We are talking about social media use, restaurants visited, and things purchased (Silverman, 2016). All these results could also be used to filter potential employees for medical reasons.
3. Credit score: Here is a strange and disturbing use of profiling. It seems that your credit score is a better predictor of your future driving habits than your actual driving record. Many car insurance companies are now using that score to determine your premiums (Federal Trade Commission, (2013).
4. Big Brother: Recently China has begun experimenting with a new form of social engineering using social credit scoring system. If a citizen behaves in a way deemed socially acceptable their score can go up. If they are critical of the government, like posting a comment on Ti-amen Square, their score will go down. Even the scores of the people you associate with will affect you. These scores will effect availability of travel visas, interest rates on loans, where you can work, and ultimately who will associate with you. This is a particularly clever and insidious form of Orwellian control. It is the people around …show more content…
Under the current system, there is no option to opt out and still lead a normal life. You don 't own your own data and any truly private information derived through analytics is available on-line for a price (regardless of how private or inaccurate it is). The issues of social control are also very disturbing. I have no answers to these issues. It seems that no one out there really cares. At least they don 't care enough to give up free operating systems, free emails, free search engines or free social media sites. There is an old saying “There is nothing more expensive than something that is