[LINK] do not track add-ons

[Jan Whitaker]

It's not just companies doing this either. I recently found a govt 
department using 3rd party mailing list managers that replace the 
direct link to the public information on the department's website in 
emails distributed by said 3rd party. There was no indication this 
was happening unless you hovered on the link and saw its beginning 
source in your email client. When I questioned that department, the 
answers as to why they were doing it was astonishing: to find out if 
the emails were being read (!) and that the 3rd party entity was "not 
collecting personal information". I quickly responded that neither 
was plausible and explained why. I'm waiting to hear their newest 
rebuttal to my problems with this process.

So the next time you get something from the Commonwealth Govt or a 
department of same, check out the embedded links. They may not be 
what you thought they were.

Jan

At 02:54 PM 25/01/2011, Steven Clark wrote:

> > Anonymity ought to be the norm. Identification ought to be 
> 'opt-in' - not the default. And how that identification is to be 
> used ought to be set out explicitly. And not in legalese, with 
> disclaimers and so on. Hidden in a 'privacy' policy.
> >
> > Just because 'following me about' might be 'valuable' to a 
> business, doesn't mean it ought to be OK. If my local florist did 
> that anywhere else, the outcry about unwarranted surveillance would 
> be quickly addressed. So why should it be acceptable to do online? 
> ESPECIALLY since it is so easy to do and to do without notice and 
> to do covertly. even when down explicitly, it is hard for most 
> people to relate to what is happening. This is a major black hole 
> in privacy protection in practice -I have to know it's happening to 
> complain about it. But it also has to be an issue that can 
> conceivably be construed as a problem under existing privacy laws 
> before anyone will do anything. Facebook is a multi-billion-dollar 
> marketing database.  A Facebook user, I'm just a squeaking Gen-Xer ...
> >
> > In practice, Australian privacy law really only recognises 
> 'identifiability' as a legitimate privacy concern. At the very 
> least we ought to be able to expect that identifiability will be 
> protected ... instead, the excitement over extracting as much 
> 'value' out of people just because transactions are mediated by a 
> computer brushes aside a fundamental issue. Loyalty cards manifest 
> this as well, but at least you have to physically hand over the 
> card - so you have some notice that the recording is happening.
> >
> > It's so cheap and so easy to follow people online that 
> discussions often overlook the problem that this behaviour would 
> probably be considered abhorrent anywhere else. You don't expect a 
> realtor to follow you about all day to see what you buy, what you 
> do, and where you do it just so they can 'target' you for 
> 'relevant' propositions just because you dropped by to ask about 
> rental properties. But online this is not only OK, it's considered 
> *essential* - because marketing businesses have found out how easy 
> it is to do. And it is so cheap to do compared with how much they 
> can ask for doing it that it's stupid for them *not* to at least try.
> >
> > As the costs of tracking mobile phones etc drops, the temptation 
> to do will be overwhelming. And having 'accepted' it online, it's 
> (going to be) much harder to resist it in physical space.
> >


Melbourne, Victoria, Australia
jwhit at janwhitaker.com
blog: http://janwhitaker.com/jansblog/
business: http://www.janwhitaker.com

Our truest response to the irrationality of the world is to paint or 
sing or write, for only in such response do we find truth.
~Madeline L'Engle, writer

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