Virtual World Computing (VWC) anticipates increased interest in Internet privacy solutions in the wake of the recent PRISM and NSA scandals.

“We anticipate an uptick in Cocoon users in the United States over the coming weeks. In the past, we’ve seen more users in nations from Iran to Australia when events focus people on Internet privacy issues. The recent NSA and IRS scandals have people questioning what personal data is being collected and how it is being used,” said Jeff Bermant, founder and CEO of Virtual World Computing.

Virtual World Computing (VWC), developer of the Cocoon Internet privacy solution, is one of the pioneers of the new ‘Cloud browsing’ technology, which was developed in response to the growing concern by consumers to protect their online data. Earlier this year, another free Do Not Track product, CocoonKids, was developed in partnership with children’s safety advocate Mark Klaas of The KlaasKids Foundation, to protect children from being tracked online.

Because Cocoon users browse in the Cloud, their IP addresses cannot be identified, and it is the only free product on the market that also includes data encryption and protects computers from malware, viruses, and unwanted spam.

“I think this controversy has finally helped Americans become aware that data mining by government and Big Data is pervasive, and that is why we are seeing such outrage around this issue,” said Bermant. “People need to know that they don’t have to choose between using the Internet and protecting their personal data.”

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Has government spying gone too far this time? Now that we have  proof that backs up what many privacy advocates have been saying for years, should we be alarmed? From the moment The Guardian broke the  NSA scandal last Friday (PRISM)— I’ve been literally rolling my eyeballs because I am a  Facebook, Google,  Microsoft, Skype, Verizon, and Yahoo user. Though I never use these services to house sensitive or personal data, I still use them as a bio for my online identity.

The government has granted itself power it is not entitled to. There is no public oversight. The result is people like myself have the latitude to go further than they are allowed to.”  —Edward Snowden

Is government really spying on you?

I have always been on the side of caution when using any digital device. I tend to tailor the data that I hold on my phone and I also carefully groom what I search for on the web. For any searches that I do not want associated with my online profile — I use services such as Cocoon and DuckDuckGo.

 

A few days ago a friend texted me from the pub  — PORK BOMB! Alright, Mr. two-three pints later guy, what exactly are you trying to convey? He was obviously trying to receive a text-back reaction from me;  he thinks I have gone too far with the Verizon-NSA-PRISM brouhaha.

I do not believe that I have gone too far in exercising caution with what I text, post, email, speak, or search for online. Pork and bomb are only two of the 374 keywords that the US government monitors online. I guess I could have texted back: Response Explosion and we could have worked our way down the Analyst’s Desktop Binder and ended with PLOT Infrastructure.

Unfortunately, I can’t get my friend to text me on Wickr (iPhone encryption app), because he simply does not believe that the government is a threat to anyone’s privacy. He’s still hanging out at the “I’ve got nothing to hide” playground.

On a more serious note — when a 29 year old guy leaves his family, girlfriend, country, and a six figure income due to conscience over what our government is doing in secrecy; this is highly indicative of government spying that has gone too far. What tools do you use to protect your online privacy?

 

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Who Tracks You?

Every move you make on the Internet is being monetized by the advertising ecosystem. During the course of a typical day – if you use your computer, your smartphone, your TV and shop at your local stores using a loyalty card – targeted advertising will trail behind you. When you sit down to watch TV, your TV is watching you. Visiting Facebook, searching on Google or Bing also adds to the fleshing out of your behavioral profile that consists of your searches, online habits, preferences and buying patterns.

“Already, the web sites you visit reshape themselves before you like a carnivorous school of fish, and this is only the beginning. Right now, a huge chunk of what you’ve ever looked at on the Internet is sitting in databases all across the world. The line separating all that it might say about you, good or bad, is as thin as the letters of your name. If and when that wall breaks down, the numbers may overwhelm the name.” –The Atlantic

Infographic provided by BackgroundCheck.org.

Check out Cocoon: an online privacy solution that prevents online tracking from a privacy-invasive web.

Tell us what you think by leaving a comment at our blog. You can also visit us on Twitter and Facebook.

Data Privacy Day is celebrated across the United States, Canada, Council of Europe member countries, and a host of other countries across the globe. The day constitutes an international collaboration and nationwide effort to educate and raise awareness about data privacy, stewardship of data and protecting the privacy of personal information.

Social Media

Keep pace of Data Privacy Day happenings on Facebook and Twitter at: https://www.facebook.com/DataPrivacyNCSA and www.twitter.com/DataPrivacyDay and the DPD Twitter hashtag is #DPD13.

Intel and Reed Elsevier Free e-book until January 29, 2013

Download from Amazon

I just downloaded this e-book via Kindle for iPhone and it is packed full of great info with 11 chapters: It includes topics such as High School in the digital age; Your Life, online; Active Reputation Management; Good People, Bad Behavior – a really great book to share with students, family, Moms, Dads, educators, privacy advocates etc!

 The Cocoon Team wishes everyone a Happy Data Privacy Day 2013 – Let’s keep the concept of our shared responsibility for data privacy going strong!

You can also visit us  on Twitter, Facebook, Google+, and Pinterest too!

 

 

 

The Zuckerberg family recently experienced the new Facebook site privacy policy in all its glory – when Randi Zuckerberg (Mark’s sister) shared a private family holiday photo via Poke to her friends on Facebook.

While utilizing Poke (Facebook newest app), Randi quickly discovered that posting the photo to friends only resulted in her sisters friend Callie finding the tagged photo in her newsfeed.

“Under Facebook’s current privacy policies, tagged photos are visible to friends of every user in the photo, not just the friends of the user who posted it.” –UPI

With the latest Facebook privacy policy changes, the Zuckerberg’s are not immune to these convoluted privacy settings.  The rest of the Facebook world has to deal with Facebook code changes on a regular basis. If Randi can become entangled in failure to comprehend the full impact of the new privacy settings – how does the average Facebook user deal with it?

Since Facebook’s privacy policy is designed to share information – do not post anything that you would want shared outside your circle of friends. Always anticipate that photos you believe are posted in private, may not remain private. When it comes to Facebook privacy, it’s a leaky barge…

 The New Facebook Privacy Settings

No matter how many privacy settings you tweak, no matter what you consider proper “digital etiquette,” there is no accounting for the taste and discretion of your friends. –Mike Isaac | All Things D

What  do you think of the new Facebook privacy settings? Leave us a comment at our blog or visit us on Twitter and Facebook. 

When updating privacy policies go bad

Sometimes updated privacy policies go too far…

Storified by Get Cocoon · Wed, Dec 19 2012 11:46:59

 

NSA Whistleblower and crypto-mathematician, William Binney was recently interviewed by Russia Today. During this interview Binney revealed that the U.S. government records the emails of almost all U.S. citizens. Binney resigned from the NSA in 2001 claiming that he no longer desired to be associated with alleged violations of the U.S. constitution.

“Domestically, they’re pulling together all the data about virtually every U.S. citizen in the country and assembling that information, building communities that you have relationships with, and knowledge about you; what your activities are; what you’re doing. So the government is accumulating that kind of information about every individual person and it’s a very dangerous process.” He estimated that one telecom alone was sending the government an “average of 320 million logs every day since 2001.”he private

With Big Brother monitoring the bulk of U.S. citizens, it is more important to remain vigilant and to look toward the private sector to develop the necessary solutions to protect our privacy.

The Growing Risk to Kids Online

Children today are online more than ever, and are at increasing risk of being illegally tracked and having their personal data and identities stolen. These are not just teens. A recent study by Commonsense Media found that 22 percent of 5 to 8-year-olds use computers once a day, and more than a third of children under the age of 8 have used a mobile device – either cell phones or tablets – to watch movies, play games and use apps.

It goes beyond underage use of Facebook and other social media sites, to some questionable marketing practices by some of the most trusted names in the country, including McDonald’s, Nickelodeon, and Walt Disney Company. For example, Playdom, a subsidiary of Disney, recently paid $3 million to settle Federal Trade Commission charges that they violated the Child Online Privacy Protection Act (COPPA) by illegally collecting and disclosing personal information from hundreds of thousands of children under age 13 without their parents’ consent.

The personal data being collected on our children is widely available, not only to marketers trying to sell more french fries and video games, but also to predators. While the risk to our children escalates, proposed legislation to update COPPA and laws around tracking kids has stalled in Congress.

Our Collaboration to Protect Kids

Virtual World Computing, developer of the Cocoon online privacy solution, is working with child-safety advocate Marc Klaas and the KlaasKids Foundation to harness the power of technology to protect children from predators and abusive marketers.

Cocoon for KlaasKids will provide parents with a free browser plug-in designed to protect children from corporate tracking and family computers from malware. Parents can lock it into “Kid Mode,” ensuring kids only browse a parent-sourced whitelist of recommended, appropriate and safe websites.

Accessing sites beyond Cocoon for KlaasKids requires parental permission.

How You Can Help

Our goal is to make Cocoon for KlaasKids the safest means for kids to surf the Internet, but we need your help. We are planning to roll out a Beta prototype on November 9th, 2012 and are asking child online safety advocates and parenting thought leaders to help us in two critical ways:

1. Help us develop a whitelist of age-appropriate web sites. Our plan is to create an online world within which kids can learn and play safely. This means creating a framework of sites that are safe for kids to go while preventing them from visiting inappropriate or potentially unsafe web sites without parental permission. We are asking for your recommendations for age-appropriate sites that have a solid reputation for their commitment to protecting children’s identities. (Timeframe: November 9-December 14, 2012)

2. Technical Feedback. We also need people to surf Cocoon for KlaasKids to identify technical issues and make general critiques. Our goal is to launch the site to families in a format that is easy to use and free of technical glitches!

Our Thanks

We value your commitment to protecting kids. In return for your time and expertise, we would like to publicly recognize your organization during the initial public launch of the product through the KlaasKids Foundation newsletter, the Cocoon newsletter, in our press releases, and on the Cocoon for KlaasKids website. It’s our way of building a stronger community where parents can rest easy and kids can be safe and secure. Also, we are offering our inaugural whitelist creators a free one-year subscription to our premium Cocoon for KlassKids!

Cocoon for KlaasKids Whitelist Instructions

Questions?

Contact:

Blake Bronstad  

CocoonKids Product Manager

805.680.6660 (cell)

Cocoon for Klaas Kids from Get Cocoon on Vimeo.

Whether it is identity theft, online tracking, or profiling, the Internet can be an open door to a child’s personal information. That is why Virtual World Computing is working with child-safety advocate Marc Klaas, founder of the KlaasKids Foundation, to establish a free online tool to protect children from predators and abusive marketers.

The KlaasKids Foundation was established in 1994 to give meaning to the death of twelve-year-old Polly Hannah Klaas, (Marc’s daughter) who was kidnapped at knife point from her mother’s home during a slumber party in Petaluma, California, on October 1, 1993. People from her home town and throughout the world helped search for her. Polly’s body was found on December 3, 1993. She was a daughter, a step-sister, a student, a friend, and a grandchild.

With criminals, deviants and sexual predators actively targeting children who browse the web (coupled with the naivety of our children) -as parents, it’s up to us to ensure that our children do not wander into the streets of the world-wild web alone.

Protecting Our Children Online

The need to protect our children continues to grow as their use of computers and mobile devices increases. According to a 2011 Common Sense Media Report, “Zero to Eight: Children’s Media Use in America,” 52% of all children (age 0-8) now have access to a mobile device. Computer use is even more prevalent, with 53% of all 2 to 4 year-olds having used a computer, and 90% of 5 to 8 year-olds having done so.

For Parents

-The Internet can be an open door to a child’s personal information, whether it is identity theft, online tracking, profiling, or cyber-predators.

-Society has an obligation to protect our children and online safety for children should be a priority.COPPA was drafted to protect kids online privacy in 1998. Since then, we have seen the advent of social media, smartphones, tablets, open Wi-Fi connections, iTunes, online gaming, and online homework and proposed updates to the law have stalled out in Congress. Collaborations – such as the one we have formed between KlaasKids and Virtual World Computing – can be part of the solution by providing more parental tools and education for child online safety.

-Cocoon for KlaasKids will be launched in January 2013, and has the potential to provide millions of parents a free tool to manage their kids website visits and protect their family’s personal information whether on their computer, iPad, iPhone, or other personal devices.

Cocoon for KlaasKids Features

Along with Cocoon’s online privacy and security tools that help shield personal information, it will include a parent-sourced whitelist of recommended, appropriate websites.

How Cocoon for KlaasKids Works

Parents lock Cocoon for KlaasKids into ‘kid mode’ to enable safety features. Kids then log in to access sites approved for them. Other sites require parental permission which can be granted either through an email or push notification on a mobile device. Instructions are provided for removing or locking other browsers.

Cocoon for KlaasKids Benefits

-Protects kids personal data from marketers and predators

-Protects the family computer from harmful downloads of viruses and malware

-Helps parents manage their family’s online lifestyle

Relevant Statistics about the Need for this Online Tool

-Some of the most popular kids websites have been found to have “super cookies” (sometimes 30% more than the average adult site according to that 2010 report by WSJ) to track data more effectively. Children are prevalent Internet users, even at an early age, and they are more vulnerable than adults to online tracking and identity theft because they are by nature more trusting.

-A recent study conducted by Commonsense Media (Zero to Eight: Children’s Media Use in America) helps illustrate the prevalence of young kids using technology to go online. For instance 22 percent of 5 to 8-year olds use computer once a day, and more than a third of children under the age of 8 have used a mobile device, either cell phones or tablets, to watch movies, play games and use apps.

-While the official age when people can join Facebook is 13, Consumer Reports released a report in May 2011, finding that 7.5 million kids under the age of 12 are members. They have access to Facebook’s new “frictionless sharing,” which allows people to easily share what they’re reading and listening to without choosing to actually click “share” or “like.” In reality, the new system follows Facebook users across the Internet taking copious notes on their reading, browsing and shopping habits – and that is only one social media site.

-Kids are also at high risk of having their identities stolen. Eight percent of identity theft complaints are for minors under the age of 19, according to the FTC. Further, Carnegie Mellon released a report in 2011, “Child Identity Theft,” findings show “4,311 or 10.2% of the children in the report had someone else using their Social Security number – 51 times higher than the 0.2% rate for adults in the same population.”

 

-The personal information collected on children is accessible to cyber-predators who could lure a child away from their home for malicious purposes. A 2010 article in Science Daily reported, “Four out of five children can’t tell when they are talking to an adult posing as a child on the Internet, according to researchers working on software to track pedophiles online.”

-Some of the most trusted names have been in the headlines lately for marketing practices that accumulate private information of kids without parental consent, including McDonald’s and Nickelodeon. This summer, McDonald’s set up a “star in a music video” feature on their site where kids could upload their own photo to be added to a cartoon character. They were then encouraged to share their video with friends and family through email – without the consent of a parent. Kids were sharing names and email addresses with the company in order to share the video. McDonald’s contends they are in compliance with COPPA and that they never collected the contact.

A Message From Our President

Society has an obligation to protect our children and online safety for children should be a priority. We need a three-pronged approach to address this issue: policy changes; industry self-regulation; and more parental tools, monitoring and education. –Vernon Irvin, President and COO, Virtual World Computing | Huffington Post

 

While looking through my iPhone apps this morning, I found it disturbing that I really do not know what data all these mobile apps on my phone are collecting. We should not have to browse to a mobile app site to read their privacy policies – only to find out that we have limited choices, if any at all (if we want to use their software), in restricting the personal data that they collect.

What is going on, according to experts, is that applications like Angry Birds and even more innocuous-seeming software, like that which turns your phone into a flashlight, defines words or delivers Bible quotes, are also collecting personal information, usually the user’s location and sex and the unique identification number of a smartphone. But in some cases, they cull information from contact lists and pictures from photo libraries. –NYT

Mobile apps are still in Wild Wild West mode where privacy invasion has become a runaway train. With more than 1 million mobile apps available to download, many free – at what cost to you is free? Maybe you inadvertantly allowed the app to collect your email address for marketing purposes, or gave it access to your contact list. If an app does not have settings to control your privacy or to control access to your contacts or other personal data – don’t use that app!

The Federal Trade Commission (FTC) recently published a guide for mobile developers, Marketing your Mobile App: Get it Right From the Start - encouraging developers to understand and utilize advertising and privacy rules prior to creating a mobile app. Unfortunately, there are way too many app developers who do not respect user privacy.

The publication follows agency actions against two mobile app developers regarding information collection and product claims. In one such agency action, an app developer paid $50,000 to settle FTC charges that it failed to require parental notice and consent before collecting and disclosing children’s personal information. A second developer settled with the Commission after claiming without proper substantiation that its mobile app treated acne. Advertising claims and privacy issues both have special importance for digital health and mobile health developers because of heightened advertising and privacy concerns for products that make health or safety claims or collect medical information. –JDSupra | Legal News

Privacy dangers lurk in ubiquitous data-gathering mobile apps and the more knowledge that we gain in this area – the better informed we become in making wise app choices.