Social Question

erichw1504's avatar

What complications will arise from personal on-line data storage in the near future?

Asked by erichw1504 (26453points) September 16th, 2009

It seems like more and more personal data can be kept online and viewed by others these days. Sites like Boxedup and Google Books can keep track of items you own. Don’t you think someday burglars could easily look up what personal items you have and say, “Hey, this guy’s got the complete Harry Potter book set… let’s get it!” It seems like it may come to the point where you can place everything you own, all your personality traits, people you know… everything about you on the internet. Will it go too far? How much information will you give away (knowingly and unknowingly)? Could this be the end of privacy as we know it?

Observing members: 0 Composing members: 0

10 Answers

marinelife's avatar

Because of concerns about that, I have not used any online options for storage or back-up. I am curious to know what people who do use them think.

dpworkin's avatar

I use a couple of encrypted sites like Mozy for backup and LastPass for passwords, but just try to keep Google from knowing everything about you.

markyy's avatar

Why would you want to let Google you know you own Harry Potter? The only thing Google can do with that information is offer you more advertisements.

As for putting your identity, family and friends online, we already do that it’s called Facebook and Twitter. The same goes stuff like personality traits, by interacting with people you know you are already putting ‘maps’ of who they are on the internet.

jrpowell's avatar

I walked down the street last night and glanced in my neighbors window. They have a big (around 42 inches) flat screen tv. And a iMac in the same room. I guess we all need to start closing our curtains too.

markyy's avatar

@johnpowell I actually did this the first couple of days when I bought a plasma a couple years back. That was the same day I realized maybe I should move to a better neighbourhood ;)

CMaz's avatar

And they are not doing that now?

erichw1504's avatar

@johnpowell Well you can’t see everything in someone’s house just by peering through a window, plus using the internet will be much quicker and easier.

The_Compassionate_Heretic's avatar

It’s a security issue now and ultimately, the users are responsible for their own actions. So many people post so many personal details via Twitter, facebook, myspace etc.

If you don’t want criminals reading the personal details of your life online, don’t post the personal details of your life publicly.

Vincentt's avatar

Some people have their address details on Facebook (or other social networking sites), and then (micro)blog that they’re going on vacation. That’s already a very big risk nowadays and I’m surprised I haven’t heard of many cases of people with evil intent taking advantage of that. I try to take care to avoid such obvious situations, but I’m also really ignorant in that, if you want, you can look up a lot of details about me. Then again, I suppose it’s like they say: “if you and someone else are being hunted by a bear, you don’t need to be able to run faster than the bear, as long as you run faster than the other person”. So as long as some people are really stupid with their personal data, it’s less risky for me to be a bit ignorant.

mattbrowne's avatar

Data theft.

Answer this question

Login

or

Join

to answer.
Your answer will be saved while you login or join.

Have a question? Ask Fluther!

What do you know more about?
or
Knowledge Networking @ Fluther