What is the greatest threat to your privacy online?

how Stuff Works. And next to me, as usual, is our senior writer, Jonathan Strickland. Hey there everyone, Actually I probably shouldn't have revealed that. Oh yeah, you've you've violated my privacy. Yeah, yeah, but I violated my own first, so I guess it's okay, right, And and we're online, so we're talking about online privacy. Hey you know what that seguys right into what we were going to talk

about today, right, funny that. Yeah, so we're gonna talk about is your greatest threat to your to your privacy online? Clowns Now that that's just your the greatest threat to your sanity online or otherwise? Um no, we're talking about actually two big contenders. So if if you'll just permit me a little a little uh net cast magic, do

we do? We need to ring the here we go, here we go and this corner we have weighing in and who knows how much Internet service providers and their opponent in the other corner or in the red trunks we've got Google. Yeah, those are the two begins. Wouldn't they be like the red and yellow and green and blue trunks? Yeah? Pretty much, But I just didn't. I kind of wanted to cut it short. I know people don't like the hooky stuff so much as I do,

But so, yeah, those are the two begins. I think most people agree that the two major potential threats to your online privacy are your internet service provider or internet service providers in general and M and Google and other advertising agencies online as well. So not just Google. It could be Yahoo or but really a double click is

a big one. But but since Google is kind of the dominant uh web advertising company out there right now, I mean when we think Google, we think Search, wrote you, and I might not just think Search because we work on so many other projects that involve Google. But in general, you think Google Search, but what companies often think is Google ad Sense add words. I mean, it's this online advertising that's related to search. That is a very powerful tool in the advertising world. Um, but it has some

pretty serious implications as to the average users privacy. So, and if you if you're one of those who only thinks of Google is search, and you use something like Gmail, if you look to the right of your screen, to the right of your email, you'll see ads um and uh, that's pretty much the same can be said for a lot of their services. Right, you know their texts, so they don't you know, capture your eye always, but you know they're they are. Yeah, And and here's where the

privacy thing comes in. Google can track where you go, especially when you're using Search. They can see what you're searching too. If you're using Google Chrome, they can check pretty much everything you're doing, including everything you type into the right right exactly. That's how the omnibar knows what you're doing, right, I mean, other otherwise it's just magic. And we don't cover that in this podcast. We just concentrate in the science and texts. So you've got Google

where they're they're tracking where you're going. And it's not necessarily for some sort of you know, nefarious purpose, but but it is a concern, I mean it, and it what it allows advertisers to do is or actually Google itself to do, is to target you for very specific advertising. So let's say, if you were like me, um, then you may go to a lot of movie related websites.

Happens to be one of the things I like to check out on almost a daily basis, So I tend to go to a lot of um, not just the Internet Movie Database, but things like chud and aint it cool News and dark Horizons and all these other movie news sites because I'm a movie news junkie. Well, if Google's checking that out, then they can start targeting ads to me that specifically relate back to my my apparent uh love of movies. So it might be things like uh ads for certain DVDs or or even movie clubs

or whatever. And this again doesn't necessarily sound nefarious, but it does mean that what they're doing is they're looking at my behavior and they're they're targeting me because of that. So there that raises some warning flags. Right, Well, that's true. I mean, if you've ever been one of those people who looks up at the the banner at at the top of the screen and go, wait a minute, that's for something in my town. How does it know where I am? Right? Well, they can. They can tell from

your Internet protocol address. They can tell a lot of things about you simply by you know, just you're using the Internet from where where the because it has to send traffic back to you, so they know where you are sent right just by being there. And and Google tries to frame this as a good thing and that what they're doing is they're they're tailoring your search results so that they're more relevant to you. And that sounds great.

I mean, I love the idea of if I'm going to search for something, it's gonna really bring back the things that I most likely really want to see. But that also means that Google knows more about me than most of my close friends. I mean, And and there comes a point where you say, well, what happens if they start to use the information in other ways? The whole issue about the putting your your medical records up online, I mean, that's a that's got a big can of

worms there. What happens if an insurance company gets to access your medical records, sees that you have some sort of family history of something, and then decides to hike up your rates because of it or drop your coverage because of it. UM. I mean, these are just some of many privacy issues that that you really have to think about. And the Internet has just kind of made this a whole new problem, you know. I mean it's it's a huge issue that isn't easily tackled. Yeah, that's

that's true. UM. Other search engines have tried to to do that. Ask dot Com in fact, UM, not too long ago. I guess a few months ago now offered a way to erase your tracks um as you searched. That's that's sort of a help. You could go into your web browser and clear your your cookies out, which will help. Those are basically cookies are are basically little pieces of text that are stored on your computer that

that help UM. Advertisers and websites track where people are going. UM. For example, if you went to the New York Times website, they would want to know if you were going to the Washington Post, the l A Times, CNN to look at other UH companies. They might want to know if you shop on Amazon dot com. You know, those kinds of information gets sent back to uh the New York Times or whomever it is that that's putting that cookie on your computer, so you can you can kind of

do you know, raise your own tracks. So your web browser UM and UH Google Chrome their browser and the new version of Internet Explorer are offering, uh offering a sort of a privacy shroud so that you're searching and anonymously theoretically, so UM yeah, so that you can sort

of mask what you're doing. UM. It's it's similar, I guess in a way to uh to tour, which is a UM sort of a it's kind of hard to explain it, and redirects your certain your traffic, your web traffic through servers in other parts of the world to sort of hide your tracks. UM. So you know, those things are things that you can do, uh to do that. But you know, the question is are the sites able to track you from that information? And right? And in general,

cookies don't really let sites track everything you do. UM. Cookies mainly allow a website to see how often you visit UM, and it allows you to store certain information on your computer that makes it easier to load up a page. UM, they're not really used to track everywhere you go. Although there's a caveat to this. UM. Services like double Click, which isn't a web advertising service. Uh,

they have ads all over the net. And if you get a cookie for a double click add on one site and then you go to a different site that also has double click, then theoretically double click can see both of those sites that you've visited, and they can actually start to piece together information about a user, you know, kind of profile a user based on the multiple visits. UM. Whether or not they bothered to do that is another question because you have to remember, uh, not everyone's using

the exact same computer all the time. Like if you're talking about say a computer in a computer lab like a library or something, you have multiple users all using that computer. You can't really build a comprehensive profile on someone if it's really you know, a hundred different individuals who are using that computer throughout the course of a week. So uh so cookie tracking, I mean you it is a good idea to clear out your cookies regularly, UM,

if you want to try and protect your online privacy. Uh, it's probably not the most important factor to take into consideration. But it's definitely something that you have control over yourself. So that's a that's a positive and if nothing else, there's nothing worse than stale cookies. Right, let's let's move on to Internet service providers. Um, this is kind of

just really quickly. I mean, well, well, there are several things we need to touch on in this discussion, but we've already we've already kind of bashed Google a lot. And uh and I like, I like to say, I'm, I, for one, welcome our Google overlords. But well, the reason the reason we uh sort of pick on Google is simply because they are uh, somebody that you will be familiar with as a listener and uh, I mean certainly, um, but also because they are so involved in the advertising world.

Um to yeah, yeah, I mean they're they're just big enough so that you know, they are able to offer a lot of advertising and a lot of search and a lot of different kinds of products that you will be interested in. But basically it's it's anybody of that size that offers those services to you. Um, you know, toolbars that you plug in your browser. Basically, these things are all ways for them to help get more demographic information for their subscribers. So it's not just Google. So no,

that's just the easiest target in that bunch. But for Internet service providers, UM, right, there are a lot of those. Recently, an associate professor of law at Colorado Law School UM named Paul Ohm mentioned that he believed he actually published I think a seventy page something page document on the issue that he believed the Internet service providers uh constitute the greatest threat to our online privacy. And um, it's

because they can see everything that we're doing. Because technologies now exist they allow i sp s to do deep packet inspections on their users. Deep packet inspection it's pretty creepy stuff actually, so they can really take a good look at what you're doing where you're going online. Um. And and technically you would call it spying. They could spy on you, now do they, Well, that's another matter.

The point is that they have that capability at this point. Yeah. Now, UM, for the uninitiated, a packet is the way that information gets sent around the internet. Uh. It may not seem like that to you, but in the background, UH, to send information on the Internet, a computer requests uh something from another computer, and that computer sends it back. Now how does it do that, Well, it breaks it into

lots and lots of tiny pieces. Um I think Mike TV on Willy Wonka if you will, But lots of little chunks of information called packets, and the uh, the computer send that information to one another on various different pieces of the Internet. UM, so that you know, if it finds that one computer in between is down, it can reroute the traffic to another computer. And that's how you know, stuff gets from point A to point B and back to point A on the Internet. Well, deep

pack and inspection. We're talking about the Internet service providers ability to look at those chunks of information and this, you know, can meet anything that you send, any key stroke, UM, any password, emails, anything that's going across the Internet, they can take a look at and and uh if they really wanted to um. And there are many reasons they might do this, one being again kind of selling information

to advertisers so that advertisers can target consumers. So sort of the same thing Google is doing in that sense. And uh. The question is whether the I s p s view advertising as a major source of revenue or if they consider it themselves just to be Internet service providers, like they're just selling access to the Internet. Uh, that's true. I mean in March two thousand seven, UH, Compete Incorporated Chief Technology Officer UM David Cancel said that i sp

s are selling their click streams. Uh, your customers click streams too, different people for revenue, so you know, service provider. Yeah, And I mean there there are hundreds of I s p s out there and of all different sizes, so it's we can't really paint them all with the same brush. But the point is that they have the capability. Whether

or not they have the motivation is another matter. I guess, well, they do have other reasons for doing Deep packet inspection allows an I s P to see, um where traffic is coming from. They can kind of get an idea. They I sps can monitor the system traffic and if all of a sudden there's a big spike in traffic coming from one place, they might, you know, take a

look at the packets to see what's going on. And if it turns out that someone has gotten a you know, downloaded a trojan horse and their computer is now part of a bot net and ascending out spam uh, as part of a denial of service attack, they can shut it down, right, so there's there's a good reason to do it. They can they can tell exactly what what program is used to do that. Um, so you know, if you are downloading torrents. Yeah, actually that's only aware

of that. It's one of the issues that Professor own was was talking about these about things like organizations like the m p A A or the r I double A. Uh, that would be the Motion Pictures Association American Good Old Record Industry. Right. So yeah, these guys, they have a vested interest in making sure that that they're that intellectual property isn't being freely distributed across the Internet without you know,

the actual without people actually buying it. So they're they they've been known to put pressure on I s p s to look into that sort of thing. Um. Actually, they've been known to put pressure on just about everybody. They're kind of like the the mafia of the corporate world and in the United States at any rate. So they've they've put pressure, both political pressure and corporate pressure on these kinds of organizations, um, to try and detect this This digital theft essentially is what it is. And

to cut it off at the source. UM. So that constitutes a privacy concern. Um. And of course there's always the concern that the government could put pressure on I s p s to reveal information about users. Um. And you know, they may have reasons that sound perfectly legitimate, like trying to battle terrorism, but it still means that they're violating your privacy, which is one of those things that the Supreme Court said, ages and ages and ages ago.

It was something that we pretty much have a right to. We have the right to be let alone well against unreasonable search, unreasonable search and seizure being a big one. That would be the fourth Amendment that would be right there. What's funny that you should mention the government because an article wired on August fifteen, UH, A T and T said that Google was more troublesome than their uh, their

program to install eavesdropping equipment on their network. Um yeah, they said Google's advertising is much more serious than anything that that we would do and the eavesdropping network. Now, of course, A T and T is the UH the target of a class action lawsuit for helping the n s A and wire tapping wortless wire tapping issues. So so yeah, you guys take it with a grain of salt um and uh in um. In August two thousand eight, it turns out everyone's getting on the Google's worse than

we are a bandwagon. And this is not an i sp but Microsoft said that, uh, they're actually the Peter Cullen, the chief privacy strategists, said that Google's privacy standards are not up to part There may be seven to ten years behind Microsoft's own. According to an article in zd Net Australia. So and and just in case you guys think that we in the United States have it rough, assuming that you know, for those of them, for those of you listeners who are in the US, and you're like, wow,

this is really tough, keep in mind. In June of this year over in Sweden, Swedish parliament passed a law, very controversial law that allows a government organization to monitor and intercept all online traffic that crosses the Swedish border. So anything that's going across the border, this this agency can intercept and read and track back to whomever sent

it or received it. And there's also the fear that perhaps this agency may even expand its capabilities beyond that and be able to monitor all traffic within Sweden, whether it crosses the border or not. So it's it's rough here, it could be worse. The important thing is to keep an eye on it to make sure it doesn't get worse. That's true. And the other thing to to remember as far as your privacy goes online is people don't really

have time to read all this stuff. So honestly, you know, before you turn off the computer and and you know throw it away and you know, freak out because your privacy is being violated, it's probably not unless somebody has real reason to. Uh. You know, people at I sps and and search engines and advertising companies, they really don't have time to look at your personal information. They're more interested, they're more interested in you and as a number, um

than as as a person in your personal info. So you're probably not seriously under suspicion and to jump off the grid yet. No, but don't forget. Basically, anything you do can be looked at. So you know, if you are concerned about something that might be for it or intercepted and might be embarrassing to you, maybe you're better

off leaving it offline. Right And if you're interested in organ zations that that are very much focused on this issue, I recommend visiting either the Electronic Frontier Foundation, which has some good information on this subject, or the Electronic Privacy Information Center also known as EPIC. Both of those have a lot of articles and documents on this reports. Um, if you feel like you need to get involved, they have information where you can look into doing that as well. So, UM,

it's really up to you. It's better to I think better to be informed than not just in general. Well, I guess that that pretty much wraps up our our cheerful conversation on online privacy. UM as to whose worst Google or the I s p S, I think time will tell. Right now, it looks like Google's in the lead, but uh, I s p S seem to have a pretty good potential for UM for mass chaos down the road, So cheer up. The world's about the end, right Well,

on that note, we're gonna take a little break. When we come back, I'll tell you about a special place. Special place that one might think only exists in fairy tales, but in fact is reality. On this podcast is brought to you by Go to Meeting, the web based tool that lets you hold instant online meetings from your office, confidence trim or home office with people anywhere in the world, so you can do more and travel less, which means

you can save money and make more money. Try go to meeting free visit go to Meeting dot com slash tech stuff. Okay, so what is this special place. Well, the special place would be the headquarters of Google, the Google Plex. And what makes it so special, Well, it's it's got some pretty amazing amenities. Uhwer of them than before, Fewer than before, but still pretty pretty amazing. So yeah, Google might be violating your privacy, but they're letting their

their employees swim in in infinity pools. So and some free food, some free food. So if you want to learn all about google Plex and see where these evil geniuses work, you can read How the google Plex Works. That's by Hey, it's by me jovin Strickland, and that's live at how stuff Works dot com. Right now, we'll pause you again, really sick. Let us know what you think. Send an email to podcasts and how Stuff Works dot Com brought to you by the reinvented two thousand twelve camera.

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