clutter
DIS Veteran
- Joined
- Apr 29, 2001
Nothing you do online is private, nothing. If you are using FB's tool to send "private" messages then that info is only private in the sense that you aren't sending to the rest of your friends. It is not private to FB, they "own" it, and they can do what they want with it as long as it is legal.
I guess I thought it was just common knowledge that if you want something to remain private, you don't put it out there online.
This is the price we pay in order to be connected to everyone everywhere and anytime.
Exactly. I was talking online to someone and I mentioned a website I found out about here, called HysterSisters, for women who've had hysterectomies. I haven't had one, but I recommended it to her. Right after that, I suddenly see all these ads for women who've hysterectomies. What if I was searching for medical or private info about me that I didn't want shared or sold? And these websites sell my info to other companies, OR hackers get in and they have our info ALONG with credit card info and the necessary details to open phony accounts with info we never publicly shared, but they now have.
Its not just facebook. Not at all.
The price we pay for the convenience of our smartphones and computers is to lose our privacy. Period. Absolutely nothing you do, not only online but also via cellular, is private. EVERYTHING we do is being data mined. Our cars data mine us. And advertisers/politics/enemies of the US will go to great lengths to get that data either legally, illegally, or not-yet-illegal-but-unethical/immorally.
My example is like Imzadi's above. However, in my case, it was a text message. A TEXT MESSAGE. Next thing I knew I was getting bombarded with ads related to my friend's medical condition. I've come to expect it from Facebook. I expect it from Google. Chrome. Anything I do online. But for Facebook or google to be mining my texts? Yep. They do. But the question I have to decide is - what privacy am I willing to give up for the convenience accessing online information? Am I going to delete Facebook from my phone? Because, if you have an app on a phone - even on a cloud - it is mining any data it can about you. So is your laptop, your desktop, your tablet, your car, your credit card.
My boss and I had emails intercepted by someone overseas. I received an email from her about a wire transfer I was supposed to make. It was a perfect copy, except that they used a sign off that made me think she was being snarky. Because they literally intercepted her email, it was coming from her account. And they intercepted emails I sent in response, but not from anyone else. And this was in an extremely secure, encrypted email system.
Every time I go to Disney, one of two things happens. Either my credit card gets compromised or I start getting vacation timeshare phone calls. I will no longer give them my phone # to text me about my room, it was so bad. I don't think Disney is actually mining our data and selling it (although they could). But I'm sure it's a constant battle for them to keep data secure. Sure, companies announce that they've been breached, but I do believe they are breached way more than they actually are aware of.