Our fearless leader Ed Schipul joined Ernie Manouse at Houston PBS, along with Christopher Bronk (Baker Institute Fellow at Rice University) and Tom Tovar (of Nominum), to discuss the hot topic of Privacy in Social Media today.
With recent Congressional hearings and proposed legislation for more stringent online privacy laws, there is a lot of eye-opening going around consumers. If asked to estimate/guess, I would suggest that probably 85% or more of the people who are using the internet daily are unaware of all the different ways they are being tracked and what data is being collected about them online.
Facebook is the most notable violator – constantly changing privacy settings with little to no notice to its members. Recently, Google and Apple started making headlines for their geolocation tracking software in iPhones and Android smartphones. These devices were sharing the owners’ locations without the owner being made aware in many situations.
If these privacy issues have you feeling a bit icky – you aren’t alone. Ernie Manouse’s recent PBS episode invited his guests to explain just how concerned you should be and what to watch out for to better manage the information that both goes out on the internet about you as well as the information that you and your children are receiving online.
There were some really great debates and thought-provoking questions asked during the social media security and technology discussion. You can watch the recorded episode and hear Ed, Tom, and Christopher debate three major topics Ernie asks around online privacy in today’s digital world.
Ernie poses 3 questions to his guests:
1) What information is being tracked online without your knowledge and why is that information being tracked?
2) How does the younger generation view these privacy issues – do they even consider them invasions of their privacy?
3) Are we spending too much time trying to find ways to limit the information being shared and collected online and should we instead be focusing on education and teaching people, and more importantly children, how to handle the different situations they may encounter?
Tell us how you would answer the questions in the comments below, and watch the episode to hear how Ed, Tom and Christopher suggest you can better manage your online privacy to protect yourself and your kids. And you can check out photos from the taping inside the studio at Houston PBS on our Schipul Photo Gallery.