Private Personal Agents vs. Microsoft's Passport

stefaanh asks: "With the recent MS Passport concerns, I remembered an 'IEEE Expert' 'JANUARY-FEBRUARY 1997 article called 'Managing your privacy in an on-line world' written by Michael McCandless. It talks about why you would hand out private information (on the Net), and proposes a personal agent that manages your info, in a way that you control, what, who and when to give out a selection of your sensitive data. Who benefits: you, and the companies that don't pay for outdated or inaccurate data anymore, but [pay you] for accessing correct data. Since I consider Passports 'security' not as serious as the potential of consumer tracking, what sits in the way for this personal agent to challenge the threat of Passport's centralized approach? Isn't the time right for such an implementation?"

Comments

The ultimate personal agent

[Invisible Agent]

a personal agent that manages your info, in a way that you control, what, who and when to give out a selection of your sensitive data.

Boy, I think I already have one of these. It's called my brain, and when a web site asks me for personal information, I consult with my brain to see if I want to give it to them. Then, I use another technology called my 'keyboard', and type in the relevant data. It takes about 30 seconds usually, and it has none of the potential vulnerabilities that come from entrusting my data to some 3rd party.

Are people really this lazy, or am I missing something?

Re:The ultimate personal agent

[jheinen]

It doesn't matter if people are lazy or not. Your brain and keyboard don't mean squat when you want to order a book from Amazon and it says "Passport required." When all commercial sites require this, you are left with no choice but to sign up and have your data managed by M$. Either that, or forgo purchasing online and start buying all your stuff from brick & mortar shops with cash.

-Jeff

Rich people already have "personal agents"

[JoeShmoe]

They are called financial managers. They get all the bills, they keep tabs on all expenses, they handle all dealings with the financial world. All the rich person does is spend it and read reports on the interest they've earned.

So why shouldn't the rest of us have the same thing? I hate having to update dozens of records across the country every time i change an address or lose a credit card. Switching banks caused a huge uproar in my automatic online banking.

It's like e-mail. I would have to be a complete idiot to use my ISP-given e-mail box. As soon as a switch providers, its worthless since no ISP wants to offer a nice handy eForwarding option (even for a small fee). They want to punish you for leaving. Not even that, sometimes ISPs decide on their own to change their addresses (like what Netscape did when it bought some free webmail thing, or like MediaOne did when they became part of @Home).

So what do I do? I get my own domain and give that out. When my ISP changes, I don't care. Update the record in a single place and I'm done.

Extra layers of abstraction, like this, are desperately needed in the financial sector. I would love to see some AI that could handle the same functions as a financial manager without me having to make enough interest off of my measly savings account to be able to pay his salary.

- JoeShmoe

Interesting approach

[sfe_software]

I personally hate Passport. However, if a centralized system were done *correctly*, there are a couple of advantages.

You can use it from any PC. A "wallet" system is just too complicated for most users (it can be transported, but most users won't bother). Plus, if I'm not mistaken, Passport would work from any browser. Wallet systems (which I believe IE and Mozilla both have an implementation) work only on that browser, and on that PC unless you export.

On top of that, the Passport system is more automatic; get a Hotmail account and you have a Passport account. Use one of the participating online retailers and you have a passport account.

OTOH, if a "wallet" system were implemented that was cross-browser (if not cross-platform), and more easily transportable, maybe it would catch on. I would trust my data on my own machine long before I'd trust it on a bunch of NT boxes up in Redmond (or wherever)...

In either case, personally I prefer to judge everything on a site-by-site basis. I often use a different email address for each site, partly so I can track originators of SPAM lists and such... so neither method would work for me.

Also keep in mind that, if you use a "wallet" system and use the same information at each site, this information could just as easily be shared between sites, and compared/compiled to track your usage, though admittedly it would be more difficult/less likely than a centralized system.