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Your Own Mini-Stalker
kashif.ahsan writes "A ComputerWorld article discusses the inherent privacy dangers of carrying around our ubiquitous technological assistants. They're like miniature stalkers, right there in your pocket. 'Camera phones contain all the necessary ingredients for completely invasive stalking: a microphone, camera, personal data on the user, location information, a chat and call history — you name it. And victims carry them everywhere they go. All that's missing is the software that lets stalkers take control ... new software, called snoopware, does just that.'"
So let's get this straight...
- I'm already being spied on by close-circuit cameras planted everywhere short of the public toilet (may be wrong on that one as well)
- Government agencies and their friendly associates already have records of my name, sex, DOB, address, occupation, salary, and other "general statistics"
- Corporate spyware already records my keystrokes, browsing habits, shopping history, porn preferences, dubious sources of owned MP3s, financial credentials, political views, and probably things I don't even know about
And now you are trying to tell me I need to be scared of my 4x3 inch PDA? Right, because OBVIOUSLY that's the only thing threatening my privacy!
If someone is willing to violate my personal space and physically take my stuff, I might suggest stalking my filing cabinet instead.
It never moves and has way more juicy data than my latest vacation photos and lunch planning.
Given that all of these appliances are carried voluntarily and have an off switch, this story has no merit at all.
At best it's the basis for a (rather bad and technically unsound) horror story. At worst it helps spread fear and paranoia - as if we didn't have enough real problems to worry about.
politicians are like babies' nappies: they should both be changed regularly and for the same reasons
Nah, it's possible. All you need, and this is really easy--trust me--all your need is to write an application that can run on any weird-endian processor, hundreds of different micro-oses, or in the case of java-supporting phones, break out of the java sandbox, or on brew phones just get yourself the developer certificate from qualcomm and then get the carrier to distribute your app to their customers.
This is going to be huge.
...
Well, there's always BlackBerry and Windows Mobile.
<xml><I><am><so><damn>Web 2.0</damn></so></am></I></xml>
>18-year-old
Way to contribute to the very same problem you are complaining of being treated with (prejudice and irrelevant facts being taken into account).
It's sick to see governments repeatedly marginalize young drivers' rights by blanket higher premiums, harder process to get a car, tougher fines for exactly the same offences, and restrictions which don't apply to older drivers. And I'm not talking about "novice" vs "veteran", I'm talking about real age being taken into account (and even if you are above the legal age of majority you still may be considered "young" for these purposes).
Look, just because there are SOME asshole teens who zip by your street in their pimped out Civic doing 160mph with music so loud you see the windshields vibrating, doesn't mean ALL young drives drive this way, and there should not be a blanket prejudice towards all younger drivers.
Seeing you whine for suffering the consequences of people with big loans being put in the same category as bad drivers for insurance purposes, while implying young drivers should get higher premiums just because they are young, is hypocritical at best.
I love Google so much. Look for "blackberry snoopware" and see references like this.
5
http://blogs.techrepublic.com.com/tech-news/?p=78
Given the Blackberry popularity among the "power tie" crowd and among their account managers, if I were a stock investor interested in gaining some nsider information, or a reporter willing to bend some laws, I'd be sitting at the booth at Infoworld or the Republican national convention monitoring as much data as possible.