Category: Privacy

Have we giving too much information to Facebook, Apple and Google?

David Cowling | September 7, 2010 | Comments (0)

Have we shared too much of our personal info with Facebook, Apple and Google? Facebook now has 500 million users globally, with 250 million logging in daily. The average user is creating 90 pieces of content each month. To use a Facebook application the user must give the application access to their personal information. At [...]

Who’s watching you on the Internet?

David Cowling | August 23, 2010 | Comments (0)

Over the last year or 2 there has been more and more talk of internet privacy and how it impacts us all. For example, if you have never updated your Facebook privacy settings – everyone on the internet can view you photos, profile, info, wall posts, friends etc. Almost 1/4 of Facebook users don’t know [...]

Australian Privacy Commissioner shames Google

David Cowling | July 12, 2010 | Comments (0)

Australian privacy commissioner Karen Curtis has said Google broke Australia’s privacy law when it collected private Wi-Fi data. Communications Minister, Stephen Conroy, previously shamed Google over their ‘creepy privacy policies’. Curtis commented: ‘Collecting personal information in these circumstances is a very serious matter. Australians should reasonably expect that private communications remain private’. The Australian Federal [...]

Google fighting to make censorship illegal

David Cowling | June 15, 2010 | Comments (0)

It seems Google has had enough of the Chinese and Vietnamese internet filters (amongst other countries) and is look at taking further action. Google is working with the U.S. government to try to make it illegal for countries to censor the Internet using the rules of international trade. Listing broker head of communications, Robert Boorstin, [...]

Foursquare v Gowalla v Brightkite

David Cowling | June 11, 2010 | Comments (0)

In Australia Foursquare has gained alot of users and attention over the past couple months. Not quiet at the same level, Gowalla a similar Geo-location service has enjoyed success in Australia with more game like features. Brightkite is another new entrant to the market and whilst not as big as Foursquare or Gowalla they have [...]

Facebook’s Advertiser Clients Increase by 400%

David Cowling | June 4, 2010 | Comments (0)

According to recent reports Facebook has increased in number of advertisers over the past year by 400% A common misconception amongst users is that Facebook sells their users data to 3rd party companies. Facebook has never done this – all private data submitted to Facebook does not get sent to 3rd party companies. Another area [...]

Mark Zuckerberg on Facebook privacy: VIDEO

David Cowling | June 2, 2010 | Comments (0)

Q&A session with Facebook’s CEO Mark Zuckerberg on the latest privacy changes by Facebook. Mark discusses how users will be able to edit their privacy settings in a much simpler format that previously available. Mark says it was never Facebook’s intention to make settings complicated for users. As a result the engineering team has been [...]

The End for Facebook?

David Cowling | May 29, 2010 | Comments (0)

May 31 has been labelled as ‘Quit facebook day’. Is this really the end for Facebook? There have been recent global movements to put an end to Facebook’s monopolising of the web, mainly because of their privacy policies. There are a couple of reasons why people are scared of what Facebook is doing such as making more information available [...]

Privacy search engine to launch in Australia

David Cowling | May 28, 2010 | Comments (0)

A new search engine is coming to Australia that focuses on the privacy of user searches – www.Startpage.com/au Startpage is made by a company in the Netherlands called Ixquick and several representative will be coming to Australia in early June to speak with Government officials and privacy advocates. Ixquick CEO Robert Beens commented: ‘The serious [...]

New Facebook privacy controls

David Cowling | May 27, 2010 | Comments (1)

Facebook is in the process of rolling out their new privacy controls. Facebook is simplifying their system so with a single click you are able to set the privacy option on various account and information settings. Mark Zuckerberg announced the changes yesterday and there has been positive comments from various Government officials, Senators and technology [...]