[iDC] Spy on Your Workers with Google Latitude

Sun Feb 8 03:50:30 UTC 2009

Threats of surveillance by employers, stalkers, obsessive friends,  
etc, have existed long before Latitude, and most methods are must  
easier to employ than surreptitiously activating a service on someone  
else's phone

The PI press release is a bit over the top, IMO. Although I agree with  
them that GOOG should create a more persistent warning/reminder for  
users that the service is active. See <http://michaelzimmer.org/2009/02/06/with-latitude-google-actually-got-it-mostly-right/ 
 >

-mz

-- 
Michael Zimmer, PhD
Assistant Professor, School of Information Studies
Associate, Center for Information Policy Research
University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee
e: zimmerm at uwm.edu
w: www.michaelzimmer.org

On Feb 6, 2009, at 7:50 PM, Lucia Sommer wrote:

> Hi Michael,
> to my mind the concerns surrounding surveillance in this case aren't  
> limited to privacy, but extend beyond that to include human rights  
> issues like workers' rights. Surveillance by ones' employers may not  
> be optional if one wants to keep the job. Concerns have also been  
> raised about Google's security safeguards -- quoting:
>
> However, London-based Privacy International says it has identified  
> several potential methods for covertly tracking the locations of  
> mobile devices without the knowledge or consent of their users.
>
> [edit]
> For example, the privacy watchdog said enterprises could provide  
> their workers with phones on which Google Latitude has already been  
> enabled, allowing the movements of staff members to be tracked by  
> senior management without their knowledge. Any phone left unattended  
> would be vulnerable to having Google Latitude installed without the  
> knowledge of the handset's owner, the group warned. Additionally,  
> phones given as gifts would potentially be subject to the same  
> privacy violations.
>
> Masking Movements
>
> The documentation for Google Latitude says users can mask their  
> movements any time they wish. "You can hide your current location  
> from all friends or from individual friends at any time," Google  
> said. "When you hide your location, your friends will not see your  
> photo icon on a map and will not see a location for you in their  
> list view."
>
> But Privacy International warns that the same masking technology  
> could be used by others to prevent smartphone users from realizing  
> they are being tracked.
>
> "The only means of minimizing this threat might be a regular message  
> sent to a phone advising that it has been Latitude-enabled," the  
> watchdog said. "However, according to Google, this function is  
> available only in certain circumstances" and may only apply to  
> "certain unspecified phone types."
>
> As it stands now, Davies noted, Latitude could be a gift to  
> stalkers, prying employers, jealous partners, and obsessive friends.  
> "The dangers to a user's privacy and security are as limitless as  
> the imagination of those who would abuse this technology," Davies  
> said.
>
> http://www.sci-tech-today.com/news/Misuse-of-Google-Latitude-Feared/story.xhtml?story_id=012001GSW8JC
>
>
> Best,
>
> Lucia
>
>
>
>
> On Fri, Feb 6, 2009 at 8:04 PM, Michael Zimmer <zimmerm at uwm.edu>  
> wrote:
> Rarely am I a Google apologist when it comes to privacy, but they've  
> actually done a pretty good job with this one. It is fully opt-in,  
> you can fine tune precisely who gets to see your location (and how  
> granular you want that location-data to be), and, according to their  
> own privacy help video [1], Google doesn't keep a log of all your  
> pings to the system.
>
> [1] http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=u9H4xaTspaQ
>
> --
> Michael Zimmer, PhD
> Assistant Professor, School of Information Studies
> Associate, Center for Information Policy Research
> University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee
> e: zimmerm at uwm.edu
> w: www.michaelzimmer.org
>
>
>
> On Feb 5, 2009, at 11:14 AM, Lucia Sommer wrote:
>
>> another one for the normalization-of-surveillance files:
>>
>> Spy on Your Workers with Google Latitude
>> http://www.pcworld.com/businesscenter/article/158975/spy_on_your_workers_with_google_latitude.html
>>
>>
>>
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>
>
>
> -- 
> Lucia Sommer
> 60 College Street
> Buffalo, NY 14201
> (716) 359-3061
>
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