Glassmap Suggests Privacy Dialog

A new real-time location sharing service called Glassmap is now available. Its founders have made their company’s stand when comes to privacy very clear. Observers claim that many online users are becoming more involved with software services and applications. Some of them admitted that their day would not be complete if they could not share pictures, post comments, or add friends. This may be due to a force that links a user to a certain software service or application.

Glassmap had the “Post to Facebook” option in its registration process, which solicited unfavorable comments. This has been criticized for alleged user privacy violations. If the user leaves this option checked, his or her Facebook Timeline would show an invitation to join Glassmap. Critics say that this exposes users to more privacy risks even if they might be benefited from it. This option is no longer available because Facebook told the company to eliminate this “feature”.

The founders are pushing for a real dialog about online privacy rather than wasting creative minds and technology on insignificant controversies. Instead, those concerned should start an investigation on important areas that need to be given real attention. There are four of these areas: real-time adaptability, transparency, the right amount of privacy, and user-service symmetry.

As often as the user changes his or her location, privacy thresholds continuously change. There are social networking companies like Facebook that offer their users the option to choose privacy thresholds. But this is still far from real-time adaptability. If this is to happen, users must be enabled to adjust privacy thresholds without difficulty as he or she moves from place to place. This kind of feature is yet to be experienced.

Other social networking sites are also shown disapproval due to lack of transparency. The definition of being transparent is that users clearly see their actual privacy settings. Users have to see not only which part of their information is shared but also with whom they share it with. There is a need to fine tune sharing someone’s information with “friends of friends”. It might seem alright to share with “friends”, but not with “friends of friends”.

Users deserve the right amount of privacy in order for it to be better privacy. This right amount is found in-between sharing everything and sharing nothing. The two extremes cannot give the right amount of privacy. Ideally, this can be found somewhere between these two. While this must be sought, transparency and control should still be preserved.

Different sectors are focusing their efforts at improving user-to-user relationships. But many privacy issues will clear up by enhancing user-to-service relationships. To realize this, service companies must present back to users the information that they gather. This is necessary because users must know what information is being collected from them. Finally, since service companies act as user-to-user proxies, they have to be more open to them.

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