我们的应用程序每天24小时跟踪我们

经过:约翰·多诺万

陆军士兵健身追踪器
The U.S. Department of Defense is evaluating further guidance of fitness trackers used in soldiers' physical fitness activities after reports of "heat maps" that can track soldiers' locations using data from the trackers were published online.U.S. Army Reserve photo by Master Sgt. Michel Sauret

You are being tracked. If you have a smartphone, if you're ever on the internet, if you've at any time punched your way through anonline user agreement在没有彻底阅读所有12,000个单词的情况下,您就会受到跟踪。

Maybe you feel a little uneasy about that. Maybe you try not to think about it. Maybe, really, you figure that it's not that big of a deal.

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Maybe you ought to wake up.

乔·塔(Joe Touch)说:“人们不知道这里放弃了什么。”Postel Center for Experimental Networkingat the University of Southern California's Information Sciences Institute. "People don't know what they're giving up, and they don't know what they're exposing because it doesn't come back and bite them immediately."

被追踪的人们的最新示例 - 从字面上跟踪,就像每一步一样 -headlines late January 2018when an Australian student and analyst noted that Strava, a social networking site for athletes, had perhaps unwittingly given away the movement of certain people and, by doing so, highlighted roads on U.S. military bases throughout the world. Strava published a "heatmap" last year that tracks the movement of its members; some of them, using smartphone apps or wearable fitness devices to connect to the network, work out on U.S. military installations. The White House called Strava's map a "security risk." The五角大楼已经发出警告to its personnel.

"We take these matters seriously, and we are reviewing the situation to determine if any additional training or guidance is required, and if any additional policy must be developed to ensure the continued safety of DoD personnel at home and abroad," Army Col. Robert Manning III在一份声明中说。

具有讽刺意味的是:Strava用户无需共享所有这些敏感信息。他们本可以在不让世界知道的情况下跟踪锻炼。

“重要的是要注意,GPS(当前部署)是一个单向信号,已在本地集成以计算位置和时间。绝对没有理由GPS receiver(所有设备都是)需要“共享”该信息才能运行,” Touch在以后的电子邮件中解释说。Garmin和那个时代的其他设备确实或按需。这可以通过指示哪些图值感兴趣来揭示用户的位置...登录未来使用条目的系统是(IMO)这样做是为了使信息获利,而不是主要提供用户服务。”

众所周知,Strava丑闻只是我们的个人信息受到损害的一个例子。但是它一直在发生。是否是黑客闯入信用局Equifaxlast year to snag info on 143 million Americans, or the 40 million accounts hacked atTarget2013年,或在A中违反的5亿帐户Yahoo!hack in 2014, our information is out there to be had.

Sometimes, as was the case with Strava, there's nothing patently illegal about it. We often willingly, even as we don't completely understand the ramifications, hand over some of our most sensitive and valuable information.Social Security numbers. Dates of birth. Bank account numbers. Where we are. What we're doing.

也许有些人的想法是,每个人都收集信息,以及用于邪恶目的的真正有用的东西的机会非常遥远。或:有什么大不了的?

“隐私是无法恢复的,”现为独立顾问Touch说。“天真地相信,公开您的个人隐私是'安全'的,因为'其他所有人都在做'。危险正是该假设不正确的时候。”

Once it's out there, it's out there forever.

How to Keep Your Info Private

When privacy is compromised, whether it's a company knowing your every step or a hacker stealing your identity, there's usually plenty of fault to go around. Sometimes it's you just not paying close enough attention to your valuables.

“有些人很高兴在度假中发布地理标签的照片,甚至在他们离开时都在博客上写有关他们的大旅行的博客 - 直到被抢劫,因为小偷知道他们不在城里[见pleaserobme.com]," Touch says. "The big deal is that it's too easy to not think about the consequences until it's too late."

But sometimes — this may have been the case with Strava — you can be vigilant and still get caught with your guard down.

Those using the Strava service could have opted out of tracking (though that's kind of the point of the site) ... but it wouldn't have been easy. Strava has as many as七个不同的安全步骤to undertake to be completely under the radar. That's a lot to ask of anyone.

但是,这与许多应用程序没有什么不同,默认设置允许应用程序收集尽可能多的信息,而不是让用户选择进入该设置。那些12,000个字的用户协议也列出了可以和不能收集的内容的条款。但是谁读了他们?

So what is Touch's main concern? What companies tell their consumers, he says. "Even if we require that they disclose what they collect (which should be legally required), they currently don't require opt-in nor are they required to have positive confirmation when they change the terms of service. If they can change the rules without consumers' active confirmation, then there is no point," Touch says in an email.

He says it's easy to tell consumers what they're giving away in terms of privacy, and to make them explicitly agree to changes in terms of service. "Make systems based on collected information stop working until we actively agree," Touch says. "Only then will we start to understand what's being taken from us."

If you don't want your personal business out there for everyone to gather, Touch has one simple rule: Don't give anyone any information that you wouldn't want on a billboard.

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