A nation of snoops and gossips
By Simon Bisson & Mary Branscombe in Editorial
Posted in Business, Security on
You have no privacy, Larry Ellison said a few years ago; get over it. Is that because of governments and security agencies keeping track of you - or because of how much personal information you hand out yourself? If you want to break into someone’s bank account, most of the ’secret questions’ used for security are probably answered on their Facebook account. And how about the information you give away when you sign up for a special offer or fill in a survey?
If you don’t remember to go tick the box to say it can’t go to third parties, some marketing companies will happily pass along anything they know about your religious beliefs (one in ten), ethnic background (one in seven) and sexual orientation (one in fourteen). And your mobile phone number and marital status… And if you don’t care who knows that, are you happy that one in four pass along your credit card details? Only 3% would hand over your national ID number if they had it - and they would keep secret your job performance, your biometrics - and possibly in light of the Facebook Beacon debacle, what movies you’ve rented.
These figures come from a survey done for StrongMail, an email delivery company, and show the difference you’d expect between data protection professionals believing customers should have more privacy than marketing professionals. But the real answer is if you don’t want something passed on, don’t tell anyone in the first place - because StrongMail’s figures also suggest two thirds of all companies have lost customer data somewhere along the line.
And make sure anything you’re passing on is something you’re supposed to know; according to Cyber-Ark’s survey a third of people who work in IT are happy to use the passwords they have access to for snooping on salary details, M & A plans, people’s personal emails and minutes of board meetings. And the passwords that protect anything that’s supposed to be secure? you know you don’t change them when someone in IT leaves. A third of admin passwords get changed once a quarter but nearly one in ten never get changed at all. If someone leaves in a bad mood, they can come back and check out personal customer details and company secrets any time they feel like remoting in.
If you want privacy for your own details or your company, it’s time to do something about it.
-Mary
Rated: 80% (1 votes)
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[…] A nation of snoops and gossips …don’t remember to go tick the box to say it can’t go to third parties, some marketing companies will happily pass along anything they know… […]
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