Fb

[multiweb]

Interesting read here (http://www.smh.com.au/technology/technology-news/facebook-reveals-its-usertracking-secrets-20111118-1nlv0.html).

[Octane]

Just one more reason I'm glad I'm not an account holder.

Scary.

H

[jjjnettie]

I'm a good girl, it doesn't bother me. :)

[multiweb]

That's the bit that made me laugh ...



... Barry Schnitt ... more like bullschnitt :P

[Stardrifter_WA]

Funny! :lol: I wouldn't use any social media, apart from IIS. Once you put something on FB you can never remove it.

[Kal]

even on this forum thread page in IIS we are being monitored/tracked by google analytics:

Google Analytics is the enterprise-class web analytics solution that gives you rich insights into your website traffic and marketing effectiveness. Powerful, flexible and easy-to-use features now let you see and analyze your traffic data in an entirely new way. With Google Analytics, you're more prepared to write better-targeted ads, strengthen your marketing initiatives and create higher converting websites.

[multiweb]

I have absolutely no problem with that. Google is a search engine. If you use it then yep, they track your search terms. Also every single thing I say or post online or upload is publicly visible. The only issue (I think) are tracking cookies set by a third party website that I'm not aware of and that collect data on my internet browing preferences without my knowledge. Does FB need to know I'm going on IIS next or even do some banking online? :)

[Barrykgerdes]

Whenever you use the internet you must always assume that it is being displayed on a giant billboard for all to see.

Never put anything up that you don't want the world to see.

eg. "I think Facebook is a threat to society and should be forced to give every member $1000000 and then be banned.":thumbsup:

Do you think they will act on this statement when they read it?

Barry:P:lol:

PS If they check some of the sites I "visit" they will get the wrong information. This is particularly so with IIS and ninemsn that have sponsors and adds too close to the scoll bars or items you want to read that regularly get clicked on accidently.

BG

[multiweb]

I don't think so. Social networking is not a threat and is here to stay. It's just sneaky tactics and privacy breaches that need to be fixed and kept in check. Basically be up front and say "We may monitor what you are doing next. Tick here if you want to keep surfing anonymously. Click here for more information on our privacy options." ... as if that's going to happen. :lol:

[Barrykgerdes]

Hi Marc

That sentence was posted just as an example to be read by stickybeaks. I am now waiting for my $1000000 to come (from Nigeria?):lol:

Barry

[deejayvee]

I closed my Facebook account in '08 when I found out that my personal details were made available to the owners of applications (hosted on 3rd party servers) that my friends installed. It didn't matter how careful I was with applications if my friends were not (and they weren't!).

What concerns me now is that the data is still with Facebook even though the account is closed, but there's nothing I can really do.

[mishku]

I've stopped uploading new pictures (not that I ever had many, anyway...) once I realised that FB became the new owners. While I may have stopped uploading my own pictures, I can't always control whether my friends manage to get happy snaps of me, though I ask them to refrain from uploading them.

What I have learnt from this thread is that social networking is not the problem, having friends is :lol:

[Kal]

You are confusing the google websearch company with the google "we sell advertisements on your webpage to make money" company ;)

Google uses a webcrawler to browse the web and index data, this is called googlebot.

Google uses shared code on websites and cookies on your machine to track your browsing pattern on the web, this is google analytics. You do not even have to visit google.com for this data collection to occur, you just need to visit a page with the google analytics code implemented. About half of the worlds top 10,000 webpages have google analytics code written into their webpages.

[Suzy]

Hmmmm....

I do love fb but what really bugs me is that things I have previously googled (shoes, plasma's etc) show up as adverts on my page. It's rather freaky because I feel like I'm being stalked. So now I've learned that many things I google may come back and bite me. :mad2:
I've just re-looked on my fb page, and yep, there are at least two ads there referring to pages I've visited. :rolleyes: Wonder what my fb page would look like if I was a bad girl.:eyepop::lol:

Thanks for the read, Marc. :)

[multiweb]

Yes that would be right :)


Yes - there are many bots other than Googlebot. They just harvest online content for the indexing... and also some naughty ones who don't play by the rules but I haven't heard of any bot going through a local machine. I guess it's still possible if the user has a poorly configured local web server and no firewall.


Analytics is used to get a minimal info about your machine. OS, browser used and a couple of other things (from your internet browser only). It is javascript based and not intrusive. The data is logged for the benefit of the person maintaining the website you are browsing.

On the other end the Google Toolbar in your browser will track your browsing habits and do more nasty things locally. Even when turned off. Get a firewall and see how many times it's trying to connect to Google, even with your browser not running :)



Again Analytics are fairly benign and only report traffic. The toolbars are the problem.

[kinetic]

Marc,

a little OT,
I was puzzled once by my dome capture PC happily chugging away
getting images, with almost no CPU overhead, to suddenly being bogged down
and stalling the capture with huge HD activity and CPU use.
The culprit, Google taskbar attempting to do it's thing in the background,
as you say, whether a browser was open or not.
The only way to restore things to normal without causing the capture
/tracking/planetarium software to crash...was to unplug the ethernet
plug to the internet...
I since, have uninstalled Google taskbar..

Steve

[Kal]

I avoid those toolbars like the plague! I hate it when you install an app too quickly and forget to uncheck the box that says 'install ***** toolbar' and you end up with less browsing real estate!

I always find it funny when I look at other peoples web browsers and they have half the screen taken by useless toolbars :lol:

[multiweb]

Not surprised that sometime background processes take valuable CPU time and can bring a machine down to its knees depending on what you're doing at the time. When I image I use a little utility called EndItAll. I've started using it on XP pro and now there's a version for Win7 64bit. It will got through all your background processes and kill them or just close them. Very handy.


Recently I downloaded a program to monitor CPU temperature on my new lappie. The installer prompted me if I wanted to install Ask toolbar and make ask.com my default page. I said no. Installed. What do you know. Ask toolbar installed. :rolleyes:

OS and programs have become so complicated that it's now easy for anyone to hide the junk anywhere. People wouldn't know half of the stuff that's running on their PC which makes it so easy for any mob to track and profile your online habits. Paradise city for FB, Google, Twitter and others.

Eventually people will get educated but they'll find other ways. The money involved in data collections and resale is mind boggling.

[multiweb]

Same will happen with eBay. Do a search on eBay, even if you're not logged in. Then wait for the next news/promo email and I garantee you the items you've searched earlier on will be featured in the email. Every website you visit leaves small text files on your hard drive. That's what they call cookies. Every browser has them enabled by default. As a matter of fact a lot of websites will not work correctly if you disable them. When you login on IIS for example a cookie gets saved on you HD. That's called a session cookie. That's the only way the website know you're still logged in when you post or jump from pages to pages. If you tick 'remember me' the cookie will store your username and pwd, so next time you go to IIS the website will read the cookie and log you in automatically. That's the normal use of a cookie. So now that you understand how a website can read and write on your HD, what FB does is set a cookie like IIS but the difference is that this cookie will record every other websites or links you click on that may contain a FB gizmo, such as 'I Like' icon, or 'Add me to FB' etc.. because all those icons contain tracking code. Then the next time you logon to FB, the website will read the cookie and know Suzi likes shoes, plasmas, etc... That's a simplistic explanation but you get the idea. As far as initial friends and contacts go in FB they're harvested after you've first visited the site then use your MSN messenger, Skype, Windows mail or other client. Too easy.

[tlgerdes]

Most people just dont know

Go through this one.

http://www.opsecprofessionals.org/resources/Killing_with_Keyboards.ppt

Anyone who has government security clearance should have seen this one already.

[Visionoz]

Also HP does the same with their color printers that are being bought by the thousands from OfficeJerks, Hardly Normal, Tricky Dicky - and there's that "Free" web-games provider Wild Tangent that's also installed with some branded laptops - what evil ! Just run Task Manager and see those apps running and chewing up your precious working RAM space!:shrug:

Cheers
Bill