Posts tagged years
Data Privacy: What Bill Gates Said 10 Years Ago
Jan 28th
Today is International Data Privacy Day, an event backed by companies like Intel, Ebay, Facebook and Microsoft, and dedicated to educating data owners about best practices in protecting the privacy of consumer data.
The need to keep people from being exploited on account of violations of their privacy is clear, well-known, intuitive and amply articulated by highly capable people. The up-side of making use of peoples’ data is far less so. The two concerns are closely tied together. That’s something Bill Gates is likely very aware of, if his comments 10 years ago are any indication.
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The forthcoming era of computing is all about data. In as much as that data is associated with people, it’s essential that data owners feel secure in the belief that they can make use of their data in computing without concern it will be misused.
Bill Gates got this about the last era of computing, the first instances of e-commerce and the web. He wrote a famous company-wide memo ten years ago this month all about the importance of what he called Trusted Computing.
“If we don’t do this, people simply won’t be willing — or able — to take advantage of all the other great work we do. Trustworthy Computing is the highest priority for all the work we are doing. We must lead the industry to a whole new level of Trustworthiness in computing.”
Regarding Privacy in particular, the Gates memo put some things in ways we can relate to today, but other things seem antiquated.
“Users should be in control of how their data is used. Policies for information use should be clear to the user. Users should be in control of when and if they receive information to make best use of their time. It should be easy for users to specify appropriate use of their information including controlling the use of email they send.”
Users should be in control of when and if they receive information to make best use of their time! Can you imagine that? Info overload as privacy violation. It makes sense, yet it seems hopelessly antiquated too.
“In the past, we’ve made our software and services more compelling for users by adding new features and functionality, and by making our platform richly extensible,” he wrote.
“We’ve done a terrific job at that, but all those great features won’t matter unless customers trust our software.
“So now, when we face a choice between adding features and resolving security issues, we need to choose security. Our products should emphasize security right out of the box, and we must constantly refine and improve that security as threats evolve.”
Here’s how the International Data Privacy Day organization puts it today.
“In this networked world, in which we are thoroughly digitized, with our identities, locations, actions, purchases, associations, movements, and histories stored as so many bits and bytes, we have to ask – who is collecting all of this data – what are they doing with it – with whom are they sharing it? Most of all, individuals are asking ‘How can I protect my information from being misused?’ These are reasonable questions to ask – we should all want to know the answers.
“Data Privacy Day promotes awareness about the many ways personal information is collected, stored, used, and shared, and education about privacy practices that will enable individuals to protect their personal information.
Robert Siciliano, an Online Security Evangelist at McAfee, paints a much more negative picture in a blog post yesterday – probably even about the companies participating in International Data Privacy Day. McAfee is owned by the primary sponsor of the event, though, Intel. Siciliano speaks for many people when he says:
“Lately, it seems that barely a day goes by when we don’t learn about a major Internet presence taking steps to further erode users’ privacy. The companies with access to our data are tracking us in ways that make Big Brother look like a sweet little baby sister.
“Typically when we hear an outcry about privacy violations, these perceived violations involve some apparently omnipotent corporation recording the websites we visit, the applications we download, the social networks we join, the mobile phones we carry, the text messages we send and receive, the places we go, the people we’re with, the things we like and dislike, and so on.
“How do they do this? By offering us free stuff to consume online and infrastructure for the online communities that tie us together. We gobble up their technologies, download their programs, use their services, and mindlessly click ‘I Agree’ to terms and conditions we haven’t bothered to read.”
It’s a cynical perspective that refers to all the glory of the Interwebs as simply free stuff to consume with mindless clicks.
I think I prefer the description Gates might have offered. The global computer is now rich with features and opportunities, but those will be put at risk if people don’t trust the network. Please, Mr. Zuckerberg, don’t spoil this opportunity.
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2 Years After Censorship Battle, Google Is Going Back To China
Jan 12th
The Wall Street Journal reports today that Google is going back to China. Two years ago, facing censorship from the Chinese government, Google pulled out of mainland China, redirecting users to uncensored results from Hong Kong. Google took a stand against China’s authoritarian regime, but it did so reluctantly. China is too tempting a market for Google to write off.
Nevertheless, the WSJ reports that Google is hiring more engineers, salespeople and product managers and building new consumer Web services. As China’s mobile market booms, Google is pushing Android there, and opening a Chinese Android Market for mobile apps is one of the top priorities.
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Google’s Troubled Past In China
Google’s trouble in China all started in 2010, when it claimed that Chinese hackers had attempted to break into its services and committed malware attacks on Gmail accounts. Prior to that day, Google willingly censored its services at the government’s request. But after tracing these attacks to China, and probably to official agents, Google said it was “no longer willing to continue censoring” its results.
China thought those allegations were “irresponsible.” It led to some tough talk, but it took a while for Google to work up the courage to leave the mainland. The redirect to Hong Kong was an imperfect solution, since the government’s filters caused frequent disruptions.
Changing Its Tune
Google’s business is ads, and there are apparently just too many eyeballs in China for Google to give them up on principle. The WSJ reports that Google is working on commerce services and product search that will not require official censorship.
Google co-founder Sergey Brin grew up in the Soviet Union, and at the time of the censorship row, he told the WSJ that China’s repression reminded him of that past. “I see the same earmarks of totalitarianism,” Brin said, “and I find that personally quite troubling.”
“Pragmatic” Reasons
But now, two years later, China has 500 million Internet users, more than twice as many as the U.S. As Google Asia executive Daniel Alegre told the WSJ, Google is changing its tune on China for “pragmatic” reasons.
Nearly 60% of Chinese smartphones run Android, but they don’t have official Google services on board. That’s a massive install base just lying there dormant, not even able to access the Android Market for apps. However, assuming Google’s acquisition of Motorola Mobility clears, Google will be making money on much of the hardware, anyway.
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Small Biz New Year’s Resolution: 7 Ways to Improve SEO in 2012 – Business Insider
Jan 12th
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Small Biz New Year's Resolution: 7 Ways to Improve SEO in 2012
Business Insider I know, many small businesses are already doing SEO, but they can make more improvements to their SEO strategies and make their websites easier to find on search engines. SEO is important and became more sophisticated over the years. … GUESTLINES ANNOUNCE THE LAUNCH OF THEIR SERVICE APARTMENT IN COIMBATORE |
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#SEO Training Company in Portland, Oregon Celebrates Five Years Teaching … – PR Web (press release)
Jan 4th
 PR Web (press release) |
#SEO Training Company in Portland, Oregon Celebrates Five Years Teaching …
PR Web (press release) Search Engine Academy Northwest opened its doors to SEO training in 2007 and serves the Portland, Oregon area and people around the Pacific Northwest. In honor of this milestone, students receive a 25% discount when registering for a January 2012 class … |
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Tampa’s Innovative SEO Training Academy Celebrates 5 Years of Educating … – PR Web (press release)
Jan 2nd
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Tampa's Innovative SEO Training Academy Celebrates 5 Years of Educating …
PR Web (press release) To commemorate their fifth year of teaching students the secrets to top Search Engine rankings, the Tampa SEO Training Academy announces a 25% off anniversary offer on all of their January 2012 SEO training courses. Many participants head home at the … Search Engine Consulting Group offers Excellent Search Engine Marketing Services Tampa's Innovative SEO Training Academy Celebrates 5 Years Of Educating … |
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Tampa’s Innovative SEO Training Academy Celebrates 5 Years Of Educating … – Daily Markets
Jan 2nd
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Tampa's Innovative SEO Training Academy Celebrates 5 Years Of Educating …
Daily Markets In celebration of their fifth year anniversary teaching students the secrets to top Search Engine rankings, The Tampa SEO Training Academy is pleased to announce a special 25% off anniversary offer on each of their SEO training courses for January. … |
View full post on SEO – Google News
Market Target Joins Google in Celebrating with New Years Themed Homepage Logo – San Francisco Chronicle (press release)
Jan 1st
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Market Target Joins Google in Celebrating with New Years Themed Homepage Logo
San Francisco Chronicle (press release) Market Target, a leading provider of SEO Training San Diego and and San Diego SEO Consulting Services joined Google in celebrating with a specialized doodle on their website. Google, overwhelmingly the Market Target staff's favorite search engine has … |
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Watch The Times Square Ball Drop Live Online For New Years Eve – ReelSEO Online Video News
Dec 31st
 ReelSEO Online Video News |
Watch The Times Square Ball Drop Live Online For New Years Eve
ReelSEO Online Video News He is also founder of The Viral Orchard (http://www.viralorchard.com), an Internet marketing firm offering content writing and development services, viral marketing consulting, and SEO services. Jeremy writes constantly, loves online video, … |
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Did New Year’s Eve Well-Wishers Crash Twitter? [UPDATED]
Dec 31st
There were reports of widespread outages of Twitter’s main Web site Saturday, with speculation centering on the problems stemming from a flood of New Year’s greetings.
We asked Twitter for comment and will update as soon as we hear back. “Our engineers have identified the issue and Twitter is now almost fully recovered,” Twitter spokesperson Carolyn Penner said in an email at 4:30 p.m. ET Saturday.
By 2:50 p.m. ET, MSNBC was reporting that the site was “slowly coming back online” and there seemed to be few problems with accessing the site and posting messages by 4:15 p.m. ET. The only official indication from Twitter that something was amiss came Saturday morning, when the company posted “Users may currently be experiencing some site issues; our engineers are working on resolving this issue” on its status microblog.
If the site goes down again — particularly as you hope to send out your New Year’s tweets as the calendar turns in your part of the world — try using an app or the mobile site. Some users reported success posting messages using clients like HootSuite, TweetCaster and Twitter’s own TweetDeck during the earlier outage.
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Google to Remain Default Search Engine On Firefox for 3 Years
Dec 21st
Google has signed a new three-year agreement with Mozilla to keep its search engine as the default choice in Firefox.
Financial terms were not disclosed, but Mozilla said last year that around 98 per cent of its royalties come from deals with se…
View full post on Search Engine Watch – Latest
