Taking a Positive Tone

Maybe our politicians need to take a lesson from the tone that many adults find online?

According to a new study by the Pew Research Center’s Internet & American Life Project, 85 percent of adults say that people on sites like Facebook are mostly kind. Of course it is not always that way. 49 percent say they have witnessed mean and offensive behavior. Last fall, the center, in a mirror study about teens, found that more than two-thirds of them said their peers are mostly kind to one another in the remarks they make on such sites. But 88 percent said they have seen examples of mean and cruel behavior to others, and 15 percent say they themselves have been the target of such behavior.

Social Curation Sites

If you are not familiar with the term “social curation”, you may want to add it to your tech vocabulary. Basically, a wide variety of new social media curation sites like Pinterest are taking hold where users share a niche interest, or as on Pinterest, pictures of items of interest divided up into “boards” or categories. This seems to be because there is so much out there on the web that people are finding that it is easy to use these sites to 1) keep track of items of interest, 2) share them with others of like mind. Of course, there are all kinds of new privacy issues that come with this kind of sharing no matter how benign it is. You want to make sure that you set the privacy settings the way you want them on these sites, particularly who you want to share with. As for your kids, you need to remind them that just because someone comes up to them and seems to know so much about what they are interested in, it may just be because your kids have put this kind of information up online about themselves. Knowing their interests does not mean someone “knows” them. These sites are great for sharing, but they also give others a huge window in your life.

More Devices than People

The number of Internet-connected devices in global circulation will exceed the world's total population within the next four years, according to research from Cisco Systems. Cisco estimates that by 2016, consumers will own 10 billion devices -- more than one each for the roughly 7.3 billion people who are expected to be alive then -- and that 71% of data traffic will be for mobile video by 2016. And if you think you are having trouble keeping your young teen off their smartphone, Cisco estimates that smartphone traffic, in particular, will be 50 times greater in 2016 than it is now. Take a look at this summary of the statistics, but for a fun overview, watch the video. BTW - if you have acquired a tablet, a new Nielsen survey says it is likely that your kid is using it as much or more than you.

Facebook and Scams – More Needs to Be Done

Anti-scam websites have been begging Facebook to pay more attention to fighting against a very viral type of Facebook hoax that exploits pictures of sick babies. While Facebook has responded, even they conceded that their “Report This Photo” feature isn’t working as well as it should be. The company is thus looking to improve its automatic system for detecting malicious activity on the social network by scanning for hoax images that are constantly being shared again and again. In the meantime, be careful not to be taken in by scams online particularly people asking you for money.

Mobile Apps Take Data Without Asking

It came to light recently that apps such as the address book on your smartphone – particularly iPhones – can be perused by app developers and taken at will without your knowledge. While this is also true on Android devices, Google does force developers to ask for permission to access this kind of data, but this is pretty much in name only as most people don’t pay attention. Apple has issued a statement that “any app wishing to access contact data will require explicit user approval in a future software release,” but be aware that this may just be the tip of the iceberg. If an app is open (and only if an app is open), it looks like some scammer could also get at your photos, calendar, and even record your conversations. Yes, Virginia, privacy is dead.

FTC Says Apps For Kids Providing Data

In a report released recently, the FTC said that when it comes to mobile applications aimed at kids there is "little, if any, information in the app marketplaces about the data collection and sharing practices of these apps" as privacy disclosure was lacking. The report, titled Mobile Apps for Kids: Current Privacy Disclosures are Disappointing (PDF), focused on disclosures to users regarding the data practices of apps aimed at children. The agency said that the staff will "evaluate whether the industry is moving forward to address the disclosure issues raised in this report," and determine whether there are violations of the Children's Online Protection Act (COPPA) "and whether enforcement is appropriate."

Europe’s Concerns About Online Privacy

Here is an interesting tidbit. Concerned about privacy, a 24 year-old Austrian law student requested his own Facebook file and what he got back was 1,222 pages long. (Guess what – we can’t do that in the US or Canada – only in Europe where everything runs through Ireland and its laws because that’s where Facebook's European office is located.) It contained old wall posts he had deleted, old messages that discussed a depressed friend’s state of mind, and even information about his physical whereabouts that he didn’t enter himself. It rather rattled him and his vague discomfort is very reflective of the mood in Europe these days about the ways in which Internet companies like Facebook and Google treat personal information.

Of course here in the US, we are still in denial about much of this. Teens, while very conscious of what putting their information up online might mean, are still asking each other to exchange passwords as a sign of affection and surveys tell us they check their Facebook pages as much out of fear as pleasure. The truth is that data about our lives and wants (remember those familiar ads that pop up in the most unexpected places when you are online) is being collected, scrutinized and retained at a breakneck rate and we all know very little about how long these companies keep it or how they use it. In the United States alone, companies spend up to $2 billion a year to collect this valuable information, according to a recent report from Forrester Research. Some people are asking questions, though. The  Electronic Privacy Information Center went to court recently to block Google from making a policy change on March 1 that could lead to the search giant assembling richer behavior profiles of people who use more than one of its popular online services.

Back in Europe, the law student’s experience has set off stronger requests for privacy laws. And here is another interesting factoid. Every European country has a privacy law, as do Canada, Australia and many Latin American countries. The United States remains a holdout: We have separate laws that protect our health records and financial information, and even one that keeps private what movies we rent. But there is no law that spells out the control and use of online data. Even though technology is changing and morphing every day, perhaps it is something we need to think about.

And here is another thing Europeans are doing about online safety – Safer Internet Day. It just passed in early February, but you can go to the site to download useful materials for parents and kids.

Deleted Pictures Never Fade Away on Facebook

Delete does not mean delete when it comes to photos on Facebook it seems. Facebook has admitted that some of their systems for storing uploaded content "did not always delete images from content delivery networks in a reasonable period of time even though they were immediately removed from the site," but said it's currently finishing up a newer system that makes the process much quicker. In the meantime, photos that users thought they "deleted" from the social network months or even years ago remain accessible via direct link, all according to a post on the ars technica site. So I guess the question is – do you really know where your pictures are?

Addiction, Addiction, Addiction

A study done in Germany conducted by Chicago University using Blackberry technology found that Facebook and Twitter are harder to resist than alcohol and tobacco. Participants were checked in on 7 times a day and 75% of the responses indicated an urge to use social media. As the day wore on, willpower to avoid the temptation was even worse. Sound familiar?

Some People Give More Than Others On Facebook

According to a new set of survey results from the Pew Internet folks, just like in the “real world,” some people give more than others. Pew’s study on “Why most Facebook users get more than they give” reports that Facebook users are more often the receivers of actions like friend requests, likes and comments than they are the givers. The explanation of this trend of getting more than we give on Facebook is the existence of so-called “power users.” The study reports that a proportion of its Facebook participants – ranging between 20% and 30% of users (depending on the type of activity) were power users who performed certain Facebook activities at a much higher rate than the average user. It is because of these power users’ over-activity that the average Facebook user receives friend requests, likes and Facebook messages, and is tagged in photos at a higher frequency than they contribute.