privacy – The BillBlog

February 27, 2009

Lift09

I’m lucky enough to be in Geneva today at the simply wonderful Lift09, where I’ve met lots of great people – old and new friends – and been stimulated, entertained and surprised.

I gave a short talk at lunchtime, and the video is here. It was intended as a provocation – my own ‘Modest Proposal’, as someone said – so don’t hold me to all of it…

You can see all of the videos too.

November 21, 2008

Ties that bind

[As ever, you can read this on the BBC News website]

One of the throwaway remarks I sometimes make at conferences is that “Google knows you’re pregnant before you do”.

I can say this because the things you search for will change as your life changes, and search engine providers may well be able to spot the significance of these changes because they aggregate data from millions of people.

Now Google’s philanthropic arm, google.org, has shown just what it can do with the data it gathers from us all by offering to predict where ‘flu outbreaks will take place in the USA.

It has found that “certain search terms are good indicators of flu activity”, in that they correlate well with reports from the official Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

Continue reading “Ties that bind”

November 1, 2008

Is Privacy Dead?

I’m in the bar at FACT in Liverpool having just had an excellent time debating privacy with Jeffrey Rosen, Jonathan Sawday and Sonia Livingstone, expertly chaired by Philip Dodd. It’s part of Radio 3’s Free Thinking festival and will be broadcast on Monday’s Night Waves on Radio 3.

FACT is a fabulous building, and there’s a real buzz in the atmosphere. And since there’s free wifi I’ve been Qiking:

and

Of course, it’s all a great breach of privacy… 🙂

July 31, 2008

I saw this…

Here’s what I’ve tagged on del.icio.us:

Al Gore Places Infant Son In Rocket To Escape Dying Planet – the only sensible option…
Reporters sans frontières – Beijing Games 2008 – Advice from RSF
Test: Silicon Swings and Silicon Roundabouts – read and digest before taking any action
Cory Doctorow: Filesharing deal will drive swapping underground | Technology | guardian.co.uk – Cory speaks the truth, but underestimates just how painful, protracted and destructive the battle will be.
Media face web censorship at Beijing Olympics | Sport | guardian.co.uk – Indeed

July 12, 2008

My del.icio.us bookmarks for July 11th through July 12th

Here’s what I tagged on del.icio.us between July 11th and July 12th:

Thingology (LibraryThing's ideas blog): Build the Open Shelves Classification –
2gether08 | Spirited Away – what next for 2gether – Call for ideas from Steve Moore for all at 2gether08
Freedom to Tinker » Blog Archive » Could Too Much Transparency Lead to Sunburn? – "As technology evolves, the same public information laws create novel and in some cases previously unimaginable levels of transparency"
All Nvidia G84 and G86s are bad – The INQUIRER – Nvidia chips seem to have a problem. A big problem

July 11, 2008

My del.icio.us bookmarks for July 10th through July 11th

Here’s what I tagged on del.icio.us between July 10th and July 11th:

Lose Your Wikipedia Crutch: 100 Places to Go for Good Answers Online – Distance Degrees.com – Useful list of places to look
BBC NEWS | Politics | Voters' data 'should not be sold' – Another sensible report to be ignored by the UK government…
Personal Internet Security: follow-up report – Richard offers a clear-sighted view on the new personal internet security report from the House of Lords Science and Technology committee
London Games Fringe – be there.

July 7, 2008

My del.icio.us bookmarks for July 5th through July 7th

Here’s what I tagged on del.icio.us between July 5th and July 7th:

Slashdot | The Internationalization of Malware – Nice attempt to take a multicultural view of malware
Why Identi.ca needs to look further afield than open source. Strange Attractor – excellent analysis from Suw, as usual.
Wendy?s Blog: Legal Tags » Privacy Falls into YouTube?s Data Tar Pit – excellent analysis from Wendy Seltzer of the YouTube data disaster in the making
Status-Q » Blog Archive » Internet independence – want one

July 4, 2008

My del.icio.us bookmarks for July 1st through July 4th

Here’s what I tagged on del.icio.us between July 1st and July 4th:

2gether no more | DavePress – I?m absolutely convinced that for events, conferences or whatever, doing fun stuff is more important that sitting and listening to people on stages.
Judge Orders YouTube to Give All User Histories to Viacom | Threat Level from Wired.com – And this is why data retention is a bad idea. Even if we trust Google, who would trust Viacom?
Chaos Communications Congress 25 call for participation – Boing Boing – Should be fun
Slashdot | RMS and Clipperz Promoting Freedom In the Cloud – Interesting initiative – wonder if it will get any traction

June 28, 2008

My del.icio.us bookmarks for June 25th through June 28th

Here’s what I tagged on del.icio.us between June 25th and June 28th:

Bad science: Suicides, Aids, and a masts campaigner | Comment is free | The Guardian – Surely there's a link to wifi too… 🙂
ICO slaps TfL over Oyster data hoard | The Register – So if you want to get your child's discount you have to hand over their identity details to TfL so they can track them – must not stand.
Heavyweight physics prof weighs into climate/energy scrap [printer-friendly] | The Register – Interesting (and long) consideration of David MacKay's work in progress
Charter delays NebuAd rollout after outcry – Over here the relevant authorities don't seem to care what Phorm gets up to, while NebuAd, a comparable system in the US, gets scrutinised by Congress…

December 9, 2007

FYI: The new politics of personal information

I was pleased to be asked to speak at the launch of Demos’ new report on personal information on Friday. The report’s authors, Peter Bradwell and Niamh Gallagher, gave a solid introduction to the issues and then Information Commissioner Richard Thomas, comedian Natalie Haynes and I got to respond. You can download the report from the Demos website, and it’s well worth reading the whole thing.

These are the notes I spoke from, slightly tidied up.

Continue reading “FYI: The new politics of personal information”