Category Archives: Technology

Arts, Business, Consumer Affairs, Economic, Government, Society, Technology

Internet privacy and the need for firms to profit…

BIG DATA

The next phase of the internet revolution will concern Big Data. Coupled with that will be a ‘Big Debate’ about privacy.

Big Data, a Californian gold rush for the internet age, is all about the potential of the vast quantities of data generated online. It is only now that the brainboxes of Silicon Valley are beginning to harvest, store, transfer and analyse in ways that could prove extremely valuable to companies and governments among others.

Silicon Valley is well known for its liberal sprinkling of fledging firms whose business models are built around Big Data. AdParlour, for instance, set up in 2008 by young entrepreneur Hussain Fazal, is designed to build an advertising network for Facebook.

Whereas traditional advertising is transmitted to those who are not remotely interested as well as to prime potential customers, the new generation and streams of ads can be targeted at people based on personal data gleaned from their online activities.

As Fazal says: ‘Almost everywhere you go on the web, you are being tracked.’

The difficulty for companies such as Facebook, which styles itself as a trendy firm in tune with users, is that increasing numbers of people are uncomfortable with having their every online move observed and used for commercial gain.

Last week, the Wall Street Journal ran a prominent article headlined ‘Give Me Back My Online Privacy’, which highlighted findings by the Pew Research Centre suggesting more than half of Americans are concerned about the amount of personal data online. Potentially there is big money in all that minutiae about our lifestyles and shopping habits.

The anecdotal evidence is important to note. The annual value to Facebook of an American woman who is a light user of the site is just over $12. This doesn’t sound a lot until you multiply this by the millions of users and factor in those online advertising techniques – many of which are still in their infancy – and are likely to become more sophisticated and effective over time.

The public mood among Americans about being watched online is more sensitive than it is in the UK following the revelations about the National Security Agency. Many Britons, though, do feel a sense of unease at the snooping of their personal data, and how the information may be exploited.

From the corporate point of view, probing into customer lifestyles and behaviours is not a novelty. Firms have always, and quite legitimately, wanted to know as much as they can about consumers, so they can target their products and prices to best advantage.

Loyalty cards have been tracking people’s purchases and giving stores information on shopping habits for years. Credit scoring for loans and plastic cards, which monitors behaviour in terms of how, when and whether people repay their debts, has also been a feature of the commercial landscape for some time.

At the moment, the use of Big Data to target ads is relatively crude, which is why those spawned by your previous purchases often miss the mark.

At this point in time, however, it is only scratching the surface. Once the so-called ‘internet of things’, where everyday objects are connected to the internet, takes hold, even your fridge will be tracking your habits, making known all about your clandestine food intake. Privacy is not an absolute, but a concept that changes according to time and place.

The internet is redefining some existing social norms: the generation that grew up with the internet and those that come after may be comfortable sharing information their parents and grandparents would have considered wholly personal.

At the moment, it would seem that many users either do not know or do not care that they might be giving away valuable information about themselves online. The online economy has unarguably brought significant consumer benefits.

Shoppers can easily compare prices and obtain the best deals, and can buy goods from anywhere in the world. Users value their experiences on Facebook and Twitter and may feel the surrender of some personal data is a price worth paying.

Set against that is the reality that the details of our day to day lives, hobbies, friendships, work and interests, is being mined by companies as if it were just another commodity.

Yet, it is an exchange in which the terms of the deal are not clear – we have no way of knowing how valuable our personal information might be to companies, and whether the benefits we receive in return are a fair deal.

The debate about privacy and commercial profit will become more pressing as the online world becomes smarter.

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Britain, Government, Intelligence, National Security, Society, Technology, United States

The appearance of the heads of Britain’s Secret Intelligence Services before Parliament…

A WELCOME STEP

Yesterday, the heads of the three intelligence services in Britain – MI5, MI6 and GCHQ – gave evidence in public for the first time before Parliament’s Intelligence and Security Committee (ISC).

Underlying the examination was one of the oldest questions about the nature of state-sponsored surveillance: who monitors and regulates the watchers? An analysis of what was said should glean that we did not learn a great deal that we did not already know. The transparency element, for example, went only so far. They appeared suitably nondescript, too, with faces you would quickly forget in a crowd, a prerequisite for any spymaster.

MI6 chief Sir John Sawers, GCHQ chief Sir Iain Lobban and Andrew Parker, who handles intelligence agents in the UK, deserve some credit for showing up, given their keen professional aversion to public exposure in a political theatre. This should be seen as a welcome step in the right direction if the work of the agencies is to be more open and less susceptible to caricature by conspiracy theorists.

Three developments compelled yesterday’s momentous public appearance. The first is the leaks by the former US national security contractor Edward Snowden which revealed extensive spying by GCHQ and the US National Security Agency. The scope and extent of this surveillance, its modus operandi and authorisation frameworks are matters of high public interest and concern given our historic traditions of personal privacy and public angst over the monitoring activities of government into citizens’ lives.

The second is the revolution wrought by communications technology with subsequent and resultant concerns over data protection. And the third is the sizeable increase to the budget of the security services to combat ‘terrorist’ threats. Balancing the duty to protect the public from dangerous and highly-organised would-be killers with how that objective is achieved by SIS (Security & Intelligence Services) is bound to create conflicts.

For spymasters, whose stock in trade is secrecy, it is perhaps too much for others to expect answers to be given in public about what they do. Such shortcomings soon became apparent during exchanges about the impact of the leaks perpetrated by Mr Snowden. Sir Iain Lobban denounced the way the disclosure of thousands of covert documents had hampered his agency’s efforts to thwart the nation’s enemies. Sir Iain claimed it had put the security effort back many years. In a similar vein, Sir John Sawers insisted our adversaries were ‘rubbing their hands with glee’ as a result. When asked, though, for specific details they retreated behind a cloak of secrecy, saying that to divulge such information would compound the damage.

Because of the synthetic nature of the exercise, the imperfections exposed matters that could not be revealed and which the public would not expect to be told. It is from this point, then, where we have to rely on systems of parliamentary oversight and surveillance protocols to work effectively.

It is indicative that the parliamentary committee for security and intelligence hold the chiefs accountable in private for the allegations they have made and to establish whether their concerns are substantively genuine. The ISC should then report its findings to the public.

The issue of mass surveillance was also raised at a time when it is becoming increasingly difficult to keep an appropriate balance between intrusion and security because communications technology is developing so rapidly. On being asked how legislation setting out their powers can possibly be relevant today when it was last updated 13 years ago, Mr Parker of MI5 said the law was a matter for parliament, not the intelligence chiefs. They also punctured the notion that simply because something is secret does not mean it is also sinister.

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Foreign Affairs, Government, Russia, Science, Society, Technology, United States

India’s space probe and a need for celebration…

Indian Space Research Organisation

Critics of India’s launch of a space probe this week destined for Mars are not short of reasons for downing this project. Inimical for them is the growing hostility of why Britain is contributing heavily to India in foreign and international aid when budgets are being savaged at home. There is then the reason that such sceptics will ridicule this project because there is no reason for them to glorify in the achievement of the Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO). Yet, if all goes well, the IRSO will become only the fourth space agency after Russia, the U.S. and Europe to conduct a successful mission to the Red Planet. Instead, the cynics talk dejectedly of how hundreds of millions of Indians are barely able to scratch a living.

It is certainly true that India labours under crippling poverty. Much of the country’s rural infrastructure is dilapidated and investment is urgently needed. More than a third of the world’s poorest people live in India and not far off half the country’s children are undernourished. The rural hinterland lacks even the most basic of foundations.

Meanwhile, distortions of economic growth are driving a widening gap of disparity in the country as Indian society has become ever more unequal. Corruption is rife, and healthcare is also shamefully poor. Against such a troubled backdrop, a space programme of this magnitude is bound to reflect upon the naysayers as an uncomfortable and clumsy attempt at distraction.

For some people, though, India’s blast-off will be welcomed, as it should. For why should it be disparaged? Consider, for example, the cost. The $72m budget of the Mangalyaan probe is hardly sufficient, even if channelled elsewhere, to solve India’s innumerable and complex problems.

An evaluation of the immediate benefits must also be given. Not only does the programme command vast support and interest across the country, but the implications for further education and further skills development is immense. The benefits that trickle down from such high-end scientific research are also far from negligible.

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