Classic car enthusiasts have bemoaned the industry’s shift towards computerizing every aspect of automotive operations, especially things that in the past could be tuned and maintained with a set of tools and a little elbow grease. The rise of technologies like fuel-injection, ABS and automatic transmissions have made our cars some of the most sophisticated electronics we use on a regular basis, aside from our smart phones and computers, and like them, sometimes we know very little about how to keep them operating at top efficiency. A new company, Automatic, aims to change that with a small device called the “Automatic Link” which plugs into your car’s ODB-II port – the same one auto shops use to run diagnostics on any car made after 1996.
The device connects to your iPhone via Bluetooth, and using telemetric data gathered by your car’s own onboard computers, GPS data tracked on your phone, and (presumably) some powerful cloud-based data analysis, will analyze your driving habits and start to put together recommendations on how to drive more safely and efficiently, as well as providing historical analysis of all previous travels in your vehicle including time spent on the road, distance traveled, and average fuel-efficiency. If it spots trouble with one of your car’s systems, instead of flashing a cryptic message code that you have to dig out of your car’s instruction manual, it will again leverage the internet to provide more meaningful clues as to what might be wrong, and then show you nearby highly-rated auto mechanics that can help.
What this means for you:
The Automatic Link isn’t shipping until May of this year, so aside from media hype, all we have to go on are the promises of Automatic’s website. At the moment, it’s only being launched for iPhones, so if you aren’t among the Apple faithful, you are out of luck at the moment. This device is following a growing trend where we are tying larger portions of our lives to our smartphones, which, as I’m hoping you realize, is a double-edged sword. There are a great many benefits to be gained from devices such as this – but at what cost to your personal privacy. No doubt, Automatic has plans for the massive amount of data these devices can gather, and I imagine the demographic information contained within has any location-based business salivating at the prospects.
As of February 26, 2013, five of America’s largest internet service providers will be putting into effect a copyright policing and enforcement program aimed at curbing online piracy of copyrighted digital content. Officially known as the “Copyright Alert System” but dubbed “Six Strikes” by the media and watchdog groups, the program is the result of a collaborative effort between the entertainment industry and the five ISP’s (AT&T, Cablevision, Comcast, Time Warner Cable and Verizon) aimed at stemming illegal piracy made trivial and commonplace by peer-to-peer filesharing protocols like BitTorrent and popularized by infamous sites like The Pirate Bay. According to the Center for Copyright Management (formed specifically to manage this program), the aim of CAS is not punitive, but educative. ISP customers suspected of engaging in infringing behavior will be warned multiple times, may have their bandwidth limited or accounts temporarily disabled until they attend what you might think of as the copyright law version of traffic school.
What this means for you:
The subject of copyright infringement is a touchy subject on the digital frontier. As you might have suspected, there is a lot of money at stake, and the entertainment industry has enough lawyers to invade a small country. They also have plenty of powerful friends in Washington, DC who aren’t above floating ruinous legislation to protect Hollywood’s royalties at the expense of hard-won digital freedoms and privacy. Rather than seeing everything setback decades by politicians and lawyers, the ISPs have struck a deal with Hollywood to police themselves to keep the government out of their business. Digital rights activists have raised a stink about the “Six Strikes” program, primarily because several of the big 5 haven’t really formalized the rules that will be used to govern how infractions will be handled. On top of this, there is a $35 charge to appeal any supposed infraction, driving the “innocent until proven guilty” crowd into a frenzy. It’s still way too early to tell if or how this program will work, but it’s moving forward, whether the internet likes it or not.
Remember the announcement of Facebook’s new “Graph Search” feature? No? I don’t blame you. Until most folks can get their hands on it and see what it can do with data from people they know, it’s hard to envision how Facebook’s “innovation” is important. Security analysts, of course, eat and breath this stuff, and as they are trained (and expected) to do, they have extrapolated how this powerful social media search tool could be put to nefarious use. Christopher Hadnagy (Social-Engineer.org) put it succinctly:
Usually, a phisher or spammer collects a couple hundred email addresses and they’re hoping 10 percent of those who get it have an interest in what the email is about. With this tool, it gives a malicious person the ability to figure out whom to target with a particular message because they know their interests.
In case you aren’t aware how “phishing” works, the core conceit is focused on fooling the reader into clicking on links and providing confidential information to a counterfeit website. Phishing is most effective when the target gets an email that seems legitimate, e.g. using graphics and fake address from bank with which they already do business. Instead of having to rely on statistical probability, phishers can now target with ruthless efficiency any data available through Facebook’s Graph Search.
What this means for you:
If you are an avid user of Facebook with a tendency to openly share just about everything through social media, your data is already out there and viewable. If you are a casual Facebook user, but haven’t taken the time to adjust your privacy setttings, your data is already out there and viewable. Nothing has changed in that regard. However, up until now, you had a very, very thin layer of protection through the concept of “security through obscurity”. In other words, the sheer, overwhelming amount of data that is available greatly reduces your chances of being randomly identified and targeted. Think of it as wandering into the Library of Congress where the only way to find something was to know exactly what it was called and where it was located physically in the building.
Facebook’s Graph Search gives anyone the ability to search for anything in Facebook using a natural language query like, “Show me all the books on 19th century bridges built in the US with wood.” If those books are in the library and are viewable to the public, then they would be delivered in a tidy page that could be reloaded and refreshed whenever the search was needed. Here’s the key: the data is viewable only by those to whom you’ve granted permission to view. If you allow the public to see your contact information and “Likes”, that data will be viewable by not only your friends, but the internet, including the aforementioned phishers. If you haven’t reviewed the privacy and security permissions on your Facebook account, now is a good time to do so.
Facebook has announced the arrival of a new feature dubbed “Graph Search” which will allow its users to create custom pages that are built from content derived from plain-language search phrases, such as “People who like the things I like.” Graph Search will store that query as a page that can be revisited, and as new content appears on Facebook, the page will constantly update with new information.
What this means for you:
If you don’t have a Facebook account (or even if you do) you might not care much about this initially, and depending on how much of your life is lived purposefully online, you might actually be looking forward to this capability. It will definitely allow you to expand your social network in ways that previously could only happen via serendipity and active interaction. Now, you can create Graph Search pages for things like, “People who like Movies and live in Los Angeles” or “Single females living in New York, NY.” Getting a little creeped out yet? Graph Search will index every aspect of all Facebook users’ profiles, their posting history, likes (obviously) as well as everything they do that is connected to Facebook (including logins and access privileges to other websites that use Facebook as an authentication source, ie. Pinterest, Instagram, etc.) Before you completely freak out, Graph Searchers will only be able to see results that they already have access through each person’s privacy settings so it’s not like your privacy is being invaded all over again.
But, if you’ve been on Facebook a while, it’s quite possible you’ve posted pictures or comments or other activities that you might have forgotten about. At the time, it was just a harmless picture of you doing a keg stand with your fraternity brothers, right? Quote: “I really like beer.” Graph Search: “People who live in Los Angeles and like beer.”
It might be time to go through your Facebook albums and scrub that timeline, no?
Facebook is taking a less than transparent approach in its latest governance vote by asking users approve changes to their usage and terms policies that revokes the privilege to vote on future changes to that usage and terms policy. The questionable part is that they are burying that change in the monstrous pile of legalese that is the overall “Statement of Rights and Responsibilities” and “Data Use Policy”.
Are they hoping that no one is paying attention and will happily vote away their ability to provide input on future changes? If typical human behavior demonstrated in skipping past the “fine print” is any indication, they would have been mostly right. However there are still plenty of digital activists and internet watchdogs scrutinizing Facebook. Their eagle eyes have spotted the change and got the mainstream media to splash it all over the internet.
What this means for you:
If you don’t use Facebook, you can’t vote. If you do use Facebook, you should go vote and let Zuckerberg et al. know that you care about your digital rights and want to have a say. Unless 30% of the Facebook population show up to vote, Facebook only has to take the decision (regardless “yea” or “nay”) as “advisory” and will adopt the new changes, removing your ability to vote on future changes. The fact that Facebook allows a vote at all is a bit of a rarity in the internet service realm, and countless legal arguments have surfaced over whether “Terms of Use” policies that many of us blithely click “I Agree” to in order to get to the good parts are even enforceable. But don’t let that lead you to an apathetic stance – Facebook’s position as the largest digital consumer service in the world puts it in the limelight for security and user rights, and as such, it should be trying to empower its users, not abrogate their freedoms.
The state of California just signed into law a ban on employers and universities requiring employees and applicants grant them access to their social media accounts (e.g. Facebook or Twitter). As surprising as this may seem, this was actually a thing for awhile. That is, until the internet started a ferocious publicity storm and names were named. Even still, the practice has been common enough to galvanize California lawmakers to take matters into their own hands and pass a law that in effect orders companies and universities to stop being so creepy.
What this means for you:
As of January 1, 2013, it will be illegal for you to ask your employees or applicants for access to their personal social media accounts, which will include things like Facebook, Twitter, MySpace, etc. Keep in mind, many people already openly share many aspects of their personal life (sometimes unintentionally!). As an applicant, even before it becomes an actual law, don’t let an institution or organization bully/intimidate you into this degrading invasion of your privacy.
As a business owner, employer or educator, this area is still very grey, and proper legislation is far from being clearly defined, especially as the boundaries between employees’ professional and personal lives are blurred by increasingly permissive/flexible business cultures. Remember the days when Facebook was banned at the office? Aside from the fears about wasted productivity, there were (and still are) very valid underlying concerns of mixing personal (and possibly very unprofessional) activities with business/educational pursuits. If in doubt, ask your HR representative, and check your conscience.