By Edahn Golan

 

What is it about technology that gets our attention? That it can help improve our lives, there is no doubt. That it gives us the ability to do more with less (effort, time, workers) is obvious. That it’s a toy that us boys (mainly) like to figure out and enjoy, I can easily understand, too. I tend to suspect that it has a lot more to do with human nature and our natural tendency to always look up and ahead.

 

The desire to constantly move forward is probably one of the biggest motivating factors known to nature, especially to homo sapiens. Why the little anthropological view of the Darwinian theory and human nature? Because the need to move forward is true on a big scale as well as small, and those companies, websites and even programmers that create Spyware are precisely that - small and its time we move forward.

 

To clarify, Webster’s New Millennium Dictionary of English defines spyware as “any software that covertly gathers information about a user while he/she navigates the Internet and transmits the information to an individual or company that uses it for marketing or other purposes”.

 

You get it? A seemingly innocent site will install on your private computer, without your knowledge, let alone permission, a program that sends out information about your web-surfing habits and whatever demographic info it can collect on you from your PC to its “home base”.

 

That company, in turn, sells it. To whom? You’d be surprised how familiar you are with some of these names. Some of the biggest corporations want to know which sites are frequented by people from a specific region, age group and gender, and about your surfing habits (how frequently you go online, what time of day, how long each visit lasts and so on).

 

At best, this information helps them plan their marketing campaigns and at worst - well, why be apocalyptic? The thing I find annoying is not that somebody is collecting information about my habits. The bank knows how people in my income level and geographic locale use their credit cards, ATM or checkbook - this is internal analysis and I hope to get better service from this. Companies that don’t know me will call me, via a marketing research firm, and ask me to answer a survey - here I’m aware that information is collected.

 

But when our most important business information is stored on our office computer and is being siphoned off to who knows who and we are not even aware of it, then we have a very serious problem.

 

Enter Rep. Mary Bono. She recently introduced a bill known as ‘Safeguard Against Privacy Invasions Act’. It directs the US Federal Trade Commission (FTC) “to prohibit the transmission of a spyware program to a covered computer (one used by a financial institution or the Federal Government) by means of the Internet, unless the user of the computer expressly consents to such transmission in response to a clear and conspicuous request or through an affirmative request for such transmission.”

 

The act goes on to require the FTC to “establish requirements for such a transmission,” as well as to “prohibit the use of any spyware program for collecting any personally identifiable information,” and finally calls for criminal penalties through the Federal Trade Commission Act for breaking the law.

 

This is an encouraging step, but if an information collector already acts in the shadowy undercurrent of vaguely legal behavior, why should it start acting in an open way? The proposed act should also act against those companies that buy the info as well, just as the law prohibits buying stolen jewelry and diamonds.

 

Until solid action is taken on our behalf, we are left to take care of ourselves. Do yourself a great favor and move forward: Install an anti spyware program - it is as important as an antivirus!

 

Keep those emails coming in. If you have a question, suggestion or a comment to make, by all means drop me a line at: edahn@idexonline.com.

 

Links:
Wired on the proposed act:
http://www.wired.com/news/politics/0,1283,63983,00.html?tw=wn_3bizhead

 

More on Spyware, including tools to battle
www.spychecker.com
www.spywareguide.com
www.spywareonline.org

 

Popular anti-spyware tools
Spybot - www.safer-networking.org
Ad-aware - www.lavasoftusa.com