The Internet vs. Your Privacy

Written by Hannah McGechie & Benoît Allain-Melanson on 05/09/08

DAN (seeing a Gossip Girl post about his sister online): Jenny, is this true?!

JENNY: It’s private.

DAN: It’s on the internet.

- Dan and Jenny Humphrey, Gossip Girl, 1.16 “All About My Brother”

By Hannah McGechie

The online behaviour of the characters on Gossip Girl is hardly a good example of safe internet use, but this television show raises a good point: the internet is not a private place. We would like to think that the only ones who see the pictures we post online are our friends, the websites we visit aren’t being tracked, and our email is private. The truth of the matter is that while many companies collect our personal information in order to provide us with better service, some are collecting this information for their own purposes: they are trying to sell more products and in a few cases, make even more money by selling our information to other people. It doesn’t bother some of us when ads on the internet become more and more tailored to our interests due to the collection of our personal information. This makes a few of us pretty uncomfortable though. Whether the information is collected by an online store we shop at or a social networking site we have an account with, it should be our choice what information about ourselves we want others to have and use.

Personal information is any information about yourself, including your name, birth date, where you go to school, your hobbies and interests, and even what sort of things you buy when shopping. By law, you have the right to know what personal information of yours organizations are collecting and how they are using it. Organizations are not allowed to use this information for any reason you don’t agree to and they must protect it from being misused. You also have the right to know which individuals in the organization are responsible for protecting your personal information and complain if you feel they aren’t doing their jobs.

Your privacy rights online are set and enforced by the Office of the Privacy Commissioner of Canada through their Personal Information Protection and Electronic Documents Act (PIPEDA). If you feel your rights to privacy are being violated and the organization in question is not doing anything about your concerns, you can file an official complaint with the Privacy Commissioner. The Privacy Commissioner has the power to investigate your complaint and recommend the organization change its practices surrounding personal information. If the organization does not comply with the recommendations, the Commissioner can make the troubling business practices public and take your matter to the Federal Court of Canada on your behalf (A Guide for Individuals – Your Privacy Rights).

Hopefully, you will never have to file a complaint with the Privacy Commissioner: the process is an important one, but it can be very long and complicated. Luckily, there are many things you can do to protect your privacy the moment you open an internet window.

• Do not use the same passwords for your social networking accounts that you use for more sensitive accounts (such as online banking). Change these passwords regularly.
• Always read the user agreements and privacy policies before signing up for any service or downloading any program. These documents are long, I know, but there might be a sentence in there that gives the company the right to do whatever they feel like with your personal information.
• Of the personal information that you are going to put online, try and put as much as possible behind passwords. Making the privacy settings on your social networking accounts as strict as possible never hurts either.
• Regularly delete your online browsing history, which includes temporary internet files, cookies and passwords that your computer has automatically remembered. You can do this by opening an internet window and clicking “Tools” à “Internet Options” à “Delete browsing history”.
• Talk to your friends about what they post about you online. You can control what personal information you choose to put out there, but you can’t control what information and photos of you others post. Tell you friends what you’re comfortable with them posting and ask them to check with you before putting anything else online.
• Think before you post: would you show these photos to your parents? Would you want potential employers who Google you to find this blog post? Do you mind if this information stays on the internet forever? If you’re not okay with one of these things happening, perhaps reconsider hitting the “post” button.

Links

In Your I!
Media Awareness Network: Information Privacy
My Privacy. My Choice. My Life
Privacy Awareness Week