Whenever I visit a specialist, like a car mechanic or a dentist, and they give me options, I always ask “what would YOU do in this situation?” I like to defer to the professional’s opinion. Why not apply this to privacy? I reached out to my network of privacy consultants, lawyers, and security specialists and asked 20 respected Privacy Professionals
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When you have something important, you make efforts to keep it safe. You wouldn’t leave your credit card out on a bench and walk away, or leave your house keys at the mall with your address attached. Sounds far fetched but it’s essentially what we are doing with personal information every day. Your online data, from what you enter to
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When I started my career as a software developer, the word cybersecurity was thrown around as a technical term describing how computer data was encrypted and protected within an electrical system. Fast forward a few decades and now cybersecurity affects everyone who touches a digital device. The problem is many people still feel like it’s a technical issue that they
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Every handheld device knows where it is, pinpointed via cell towers, WiFi, and connected apps. This used to be called Global Positioning Service (GPS) and was primary used to identify your location on a map on your device. Today it is referred to as Geolocation, or Location Based Services (LBS). This location data is now sent from your device to other services so
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The word ‘meta’ is used to describe something that is contained within itself. The term ‘metadata’ is then the information about other information. This is not specific to digital data, technically a table of contents in a book is data about data, but online we use metadata to encompass a lot more than an index. Though mostly helpful, sometimes the
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There is a lot of advice out there about how parents should handle their kids’ online lives. I have read articles advocating that parents should have every password for every one of their kid’s apps and check them often. I have seen people who advocate a completely hands-off approach. My philosophy lies in the middle: allow kids to develop independent lives but ensure we are
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Of all the jobs I have ever had, by far the most difficult, confusing, exhausting AND rewarding is as parent. Since it is often all consuming, it helps to be able to share the daily challenges and victories with others who can sympathize and who appreciate your pain or your pride. The term “sharenting” was created to describe the burgeoning
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Every time you go online you add to your digital footprint, or binary tattoo. The information collected is made up of what you enter online (likes, comments, posts), your behaviour (what sites you visit, how you interact with them) and what inferences companies can make based on the first two pieces of data. This data is used to target ads and make marketing decisions.
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So the truth is now out. Binary Tattoo is not my first company. Back in 1999, my boyfriend (now husband) and I created Single Antidote, a dating website. It was a full-fledged business with a bank account, phone number and stationary, all launched from the lovely basement of our student dwellings. It was very dot-com of two engineering students to
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Imagine that you are looking for a pair of jeans. You walk in to a clothing store and, lo-and-behold, the only thing this store has is jeans AND they are all in your size. They may not be the fit or colour you wanted but you asked for jeans and that’s what you got. Sound like wizardy? It is content
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