Social networking sites are a part of most people’s daily lives. Unfortunately, telling too much information seems to be something that people aren’t paying enough attention to. For instance, Facebook users consistently update their status and what they are doing at any given time during the day. However, people are updating their status telling the “world” they are going out of town. How about do you have your full birth date and/or address listed on your profile? None of these items would create any security issues if you have a limited number of Facebook friends that you personally trust, AND you have your privacy settings set that those that are not “friends” with you can not see profile information. If these two items are the case, then this information might not apply to you.
Yahoo Finance pointed out some great things that you should be conscious of with your Facebook accounts.

Things you should never reveal on Facebook:
1. Your birth date and birth place
2. Vacation plans
3. Home address
4. Confessionals
5. Password hints
6. Risky behaviors

Not only are these items above revealing more information then you should be sharing with a total stranger, this information could be potentially viewed by your future employers, insurance company, lenders etc.
Bottom line: limit what you put on your Facebook account because you don’t want just anyone to know everything and anything you are doing in all hours of the day.

Have you ever browsed in the world of online shopping then noticed you kept seeing that pair of pants you just couldn’t commit to buying appears on multiple sites thereafter?  Many of us have and probably don’t even flinch at this type of advertising but more and more branded companies are getting involved with retargeting campaigns.

A retargeting campaign is simply when a website places a cookie on the users computer to track their buying or lack of buying habits so the advertiser can serve more relevant ads to the consumer.

In many instances this is a great way to “remind” the consumer of something they were recently interested in but possibly didn’t have the time to complete a transaction. In other cases ad retargeting can become an embarrassing nuisance, as it did for one consumer. Ms. Matlin was recently hounded by ads for dieting services she has previously used online, “ they are still following me around, and it makes me feel fat”.

Retargeting is not showing any signs of slowing down, but where do we draw the line when invading consumer’s privacy?

Yet another way for your friends and family to have up-to-date notifications of your “who, what, when, where and why” ? Facebook announced Wednesday a new location-sharing program that will allow you to send updates letting you announce your location. Similar to the iPhone application Foursquare that has been previously the leading location-sharing site. Foursquare reached a membership level of 2 million users in July.

Privacy uses have already been brought to the table with FaceBook “Places” as it gives friends the option to tag others when they check in somewhere, posting the updated location for everyone tagged. There is a “yes” option allowing friends to tag you, however there is not a “no” option, only a “not now”.

Facebook has said that “this is not a service to broadcast your location at all times, but rather one to share where you are, who you are with, when you want to…It lets you find friends that are nearby and help you discover nearby places”. The “Here Now” feature will let anyone who has checked into a pace see who else has done the same.

It seems like everyone including Moms and Grandmas are on Facebook sharing pictures, status updates and commenting on pages. With all of the updates and changes Facebook is constantly requiring users to update privacy settings….However, if you are not watching this with an Eagle eye, you may be one of the 100 million “FB” users that personal details have been collected and published online, making it hard to impossible to remove this information from the public view.

This data was collected and posted by the Internet site Pirate Bay. Using a code to scan the 500+ million Facebook profiles for any information not hidden by privacy settings. Stated by Ron Bowes of Pirate Bay on his website www.skullsecurity.org the results of this code/search were “spectacular” allowing him to capture 171 million names, 100 million of these being unique.

Facebook is currently downplaying the absorption of this information saying no private data had been compromised. In a statement emailed to msnbc.com, Facebook stated the information on the list was already available online.

Consumer’s fear of sharing personal information is on the rise. Sites selling consumer’s data to irrelevant advertisers who in turn spam or misuse the data often fuel this fear. The TRUSTs seal has become a well-known symbol of verification over the past decade.

Dealix, an auto lead generation site conducted a 90 day test using the seal and saw a 7 percent increase in conversions. Placing the seal at the front end of your funnel helps ensure consumers their data is being protected, especially when a credit card or social security number is required.

TRUSTe requires sites that utilize the seal to have links to their privacy policy and seed TRUSTe to ensure the consumers data is not being mistreated.

It will be interesting to see if the TRUSTe seal is the next trend in the online lead generation space.

Is Facebook a friend or a fo? Recently there have been debates about the open privacy policy that the site has implemented. In Pakistan there have recently been public protests against Facebook due to content posted on a users page. The Pakistan government ordered Internet services to block Facebook recently over a user-posted page that promoted “Everybody Draw Mohammed Day” – Islam’s Prophet Muhammad this act is prohibited by the religion and found offensive. According to Facebook, this page does not violate the site’s terms, but acknowledges that it may not be legal in some countries. Facebook’s terms and conditions make it hard to determine what is considered “hate speech” since the privacy has been adjusted and the profile information is no longer “private”.

Where do you think the line is crossed in free speech and hate speech? The first amendment leaves censorship to the province of the government, but also allows Facebook to govern what is posted. Knowing that your profile is no longer private, will this influence you to delete your information and no longer post?

A new bill to be passed that would affect what information needs to be disclosed in both online and offline companies privacy policies.

According to The New York Times the proposed bill would expand what information should be considered confidential. Such information would expand to include, health or financial data, a users race or sexual orientation, the users precise location and any unique customer identification number. This bill could also include the users IP address.

Online and off-line companies would have to disclose a description of the information being collected and how it is being used in their privacy policies

Representatives Rick Boucher, Democrat of Virginia and Cliff Stearns, Republican of Florida released the draft legislation on Tuesday May 4, 2010. Both parties will collect comments on the draft in hopes to have a formal legislation completed within a month or so.

Consumer groups have been fighting targeted advertisements, which could be based on the internets users actions. Google and Yahoo have already adjusted their own privacy policies around this concern.

This “would be the first law that applies generally to businesses requiring privacy notice, particularly in the offline space” said Lisa J. Sotto, a partner at Hunton & Williams.

Privacy groups believe that there needs to be legislation in place to protect consumers on the internet. Many are concerned that data collection of consumer’s internet experiences are not fair to the consumers, unless they opt in to allow this behavioral targeting to happen. The FTC was petitioned back in 2007, however now it is at the point of Congress and potentially enacting a new law(s).
Many retailers believe their use of behavioral targeting has allowed them to have an increase in sales. According to one retailer, “Personalizing a Web site [via behavioral targeting] helps an individual with an intent to find what they are looking for and helps the site owner deliver more content that is relevant to the individual, said Pete Olson, VP of product management at Amadesa.” The new potential legislation is looking at having the consumer “allow” such tracking of their internet behavior. Yahoo has argued that a consumer’s privacy should be respected in order to build trust with their consumers. Yahoo is doing it’s own regulatory data collecting by only keeping consumer’s data for 90 days. However, not all businesses are wanting to implement their own “rules”, therefore legislation seems to be the only way to protect consumer’s rights.
Leadpile will keep an eye on what happens with this potential legislation.

Are you ever watching your favorite television show and some sort of advertisement comes on that really you have no interest in? I know I know a lot of us don’t really care for advertisements at all, but what if the ads that are on your t.v. are things you are potentially interested in? How about if you’re watching a show like Home Shopping Network, and you can then use your remote control, push a few buttons, and charge a purchase from your television? How about voting for your favorite reality show contestant without using your phone?
All these are things that our televisions are going to be soon allowing us to do in addition to relevant commercials. NPRNews points out, “Consumer advocates worry about marketers compromising our privacy by rummaging through our viewing habits and getting us to trade personal information for coupons.” Potentially these marketing companies will know everything you have purchased, however they will not know detail information such as your name. Is this sort of thing crossing the line on your personal t.v time? This sort of thing is already happening with the internet (behavioral targeting) and websites you are visiting (cookies), so why not with your television too? Leadpile Lead Exchange does not use cookies with our lead generation, however many affiliate marketing networks do.

Everything too good to be true.. probably is.  Now all those that were looking to jump in on the online lead generation business, might have someone up above to face.  According to internetnews.com, “A top U.S. lawmaker in the U.S. House of Representatives on Wednesday said he is working to develop a bill to impose mandatory guidelines on Internet companies to protect user privacy, because the current voluntary approach is falling short. ” Privacy advocates are worried that online activity is potentially jeopardizing consumers private information, and there are no regulations to govern it.
Leadpile Lead Exchange believes in only doing the right thing and not jeopardizing consumers information in ANY way. There are a lot of people out there trying to make a quick buck on hot topics in the news, and unfortunately consumers are not always as guarded with their personal information as they should be. Lawmakers stepping in on this industry could lead to some of those not being able to take advantage of consumers, however them stepping in could also create a lot more “red tape” for those doing the right thing. Thoughts?

An updated report has been rolled out protecting the privacy of consumers online.  Behavioral targeting is something a lot of website owners, search engines and other online advertisers do to determine certain information about consumers online activities.  This report was originally rolled out in November 2007, however there was a need to make some updates to the report.

One of the changes made allows websites owners to utilize consumers information for their own website marketing, however they can not share the consumer’s personal information for other gain.  According to DMNews, the report also discusses the potential benefits of behavioral advertising to consumers, such as the free online content that advertising tends to support, as well as the benefits of personalization.” So there is maybe some benefits to behavioral advertising?
The bottom line with this revised report is that the FTC is trying to make sure that consumers are protected while searching online. However, at this point the “leash” is very loose, and it appears the FTC is trying to let the online advertising industry handle this on their own. Furthermore, I am sure there will be some sort of intervention if consumer’s personal information continues to be violated.
Leadpile Lead Exchange believes in protecting consumers information in a way that those that are not supposed to have the consumers personal information do not. We generate thousands of leads per day, and are adamant on making sure we protect each and every one of those consumer’s private information.

According to DMNews last week, recent correspondence sent out by some lawmakers, internet and broadband companies will be taking a look at the advertising they are doing. For example, internet companies track what websites and other details of what their customers are doing online. This information is then used by the internet companies to provide some targeted advertising. Depending on what websites the customer goes to, the internet companies will send out target ads that they think the consumers will be interested in.
Should internet service providers be able to capture all the websites you visit on a daily basis, and use that information to then target specific advertising? Is this considered going too far in order for them to do their advertising?
Yahoo is now allowing you to make that decision and choose to opt-out of them doing this sort of “information gathering”. Maybe other internet service providers will follow in their foot steps. There has to at some point some guidelines that should be followed in order to have some level or privacy, in this BIG BIG internet world.