The Past Meets the Present

Pre-course: “I own a myTouch (Android phone), sony vaio netbook, sony vaio laptop, 19 inch tv, ipod, ipod radio dock and GPS. I use both my laptops everyday. The netbook I take the class and the laptop I use in my apartment. Usually, I don't make phone calls using my myTouch. I text/gChat all day and occasionally call my parents. I also use my phone to tweet or play games to avoid falling asleep in class. At the beginning of the year,my resolution was to write in my blog everyday...but that soon fell apart towards the middle of spring semester. Perhaps I'll try again next year.

As a computer science major, I would never strictly say that technology could be a foe in the future. After all, too much of any good thing can be bad. I feel that technology does make some things simpler but as more and more people use technology, there is the risk of abuse. I do not think there is too much technology. For my sake (and future career), I hope that there is more technology used at school, work and play.

I feel somewhat informed about newer technologies. My summer research lab constantly send out news about emerging technologies in usable privacy and security But I am more than comfortable with learning more about it.“

Post-course: I would have to say that I am still the same person described in my introduction post. Over the past 3 months, I have been exposed to a lot of information about the various uses of technology. While this blog on privacy may make it seem as though I consider technology a foe of the future, it has proved to me that there is risk of using technology in a negative way.

Based on my experience this semester, there are many positive aspects of digital information. Digital information makes things more easily accessible. Mobile applications such as ELMS allow us, as students, to manage our grades and assignments. Many news sources also have mobile versions of their newspapers and publications allowing subscribers to access the most recent news anywhere they go. Digital information makes things accessible faster. Twitter feeds of different users enable others to find out about breaking news in the matter of seconds. For example, I found out about the Haiti earthquakes through Twitter. Digital information can make information more secure. Also, the new release of Google Instant makes searching for digital information faster than before. Now with fingerprint scanners, iris scanners and more advanced forms of authentication, information is better protected.

However, there are also some negative aspects of digital information. Because information is available faster, negative and incriminating information is made available faster. This can have horrible consequences such in the case of WikiLeaks. The owner of WikiLeaks may have thought that allowing people to access such secret information would be beneficial to the public, but now he is hiding for his life. Also, the use of digital information needs to constantly be managed so that it is more secure.

I think that this class, although not the main focus, helped me learn some new photography skills. Hopefully in the future I can develop these skills into a hobby. In addition, I learned about new uses of technology and how they apply to other areas such as public relations and public health. Lastly, it helped me learn about technologies such as 3G versus 4G connection speeds and Bluetooth.

For my peers who did not take this class, I would advise them not to be afraid of technology but to embrace it. However, embrace it in a healthy way so that it is not controlling your life. If people are told that only technology can be used to solve problems, in the future we may have people like the woman and man in the following video:

Also, beware that not everything is more efficient just because you use technology to get it done. Some technologies are just created for entertainment and not for productivity-sake. After taking this class, I can safely say that now I appreciate the consolidation of devices because using the iPod touch along with my Android phone and regular iPod confirmed that sometimes technology can be too much.

Privacy and Security: Expert Edition

Security and privacy online has attracted great attention in recent years. A recent survey revealed that 67% people are either somewhat concerned or very concerned regarding the privacy of their personal medical records. What’s more is that 80% of people surveyed said they are very concerned about identity theft or fraud.

Currently, medical professional are having trouble keeping health information secure. Even companies such as Google and Microsoft now have personal health record services where users can track medical history online. Earlier this semester Google came to campus and gave a technical talk about Google Health (health.google.com). It wasn't long before students in the audience raised their hand asking how secure would this site be and how would Google prevent the information from being leaked.

Speaking of leaks, the WikiLeaks documents revealed that U.S. officials have been asked to start collecting "fingerprints, facial images, DNA and iris scans" of foreigners and other persons of interest.

Interesting fact: The state of California has been storing DNA data of newborns for the past 30 years without parental knowledge.

The rise of DNA identification is not the only new form of spying. U.S. federal agents are now being encouraged to connect to others using social networks in order to spy on them. We must begin to create rules on the sharing of DNA, the ethics of using DNA sequences and the ethics of using information on social networking sites.

Another highly relevant privacy issue revolves around the Transportation Security Administration (TSA) body scanners. People are outraged that TSA officials are being hired to scan naked body images of passengers going through security. They feel that these scanners reveal to much information. However, TSA is taking the gradually-adapting approach of having technologies replace humans. They think this will eliminate the privacy issues being raised. While this is a good start, there are still many kinks that must be worked out. The algorithms behind such software, many times won’t know what they’re looking for if they’ve never seen it. Also, many dangerous items can be disguised to look like harmless objects. Therefore, it has been suggested that this algorithm be used with existing technologies such as hazardous chemical detection.

Some people admit that we just have to “say goodbye to privacy”, if we haven’t done so already. With mobile applications that share location (such as GroupOn, Foursquare and Facebook), they must make the user believe that the value received from using the service outweighs any perceived risks from updating and sharing their location.

A computer science professor and expert in security at the University of Maryland, interviewed HERE, thinks that people should not express anger over their "private" information being leaked over the web because they check a box agreeing to the terms of the website. Therefore the website can do what they want with the information from this point forward. He also feels that privacy is a loosely defined term. Even he feels that we don't have enough privacy as we think we do. But to "function in society, we really don't have any choice". I think that this is the case because if you want to be an active citizen engaging in new technologies, you're eventually going to have to sign up for a social networking account. Or, you might have to buy something online, thus risking your credit information. Or, it may be more convenient to pay bills online, also risking credit information. Just a basic search for information online allows companies to track your every move and advertise to you based on your "private" searches.

Even the president and leaders of the United States have unofficially declared our times as a cyber security era. Millions of people will soon be hired to oversee the protection of our computer systems, especially our government and military systems. Ever since this new initiative was launched, millions of dollars have been invested into cyber security research and training. The University of Maryland is aggressively hiring for this field and will announce its new cyber security center, MC² on Thursday, December 9^th.

Cyber security is not only a prevalent field in the United States. Even the U.K. is training people for positions in this field. Moreover, credit card companies around the world such as in Africa are investing in protecting their customers’ online identities. It’s all one big snowball effect as the problem becomes larger and larger. Without a high level of security, credit card fraud occurs and decreases customer trust in the company. This, in turn, affects usage rates and these usage rates affect profit. If all credit card companies adopted high levels of privacy and security for their customers, it could potentially help the global economy.

Therefore, as the use of technology increases daily, so our actual privacy decreases, although our perceived privacy may increase. Expert opinions, actions of our nation's leader and concerns of every day citizens lead me to believe so. What do you think?