Cellular Phones - Do They Compromise Our Privacy?
The definition of the right to privacy is a combination of many principles upheld by the U.
S.
Constitution and in the Bills of Rights of other countries around the world..
These principles are recognized by the courts and legislative bodies as "the right to be left alone.
" This right is under increasing pressure with the rapid expansion of technology, the latest mass manifestation of which is in the use of the mobile phone, and the ways in which it can impact on the users personal privacy.
There are several areas where mobile phone usage has impacted on personal privacy SMS Spamming Since mobile usage began to take off, spam via SMS text messages has become one the biggest areas of complaint from users.
But , in Europe at least, in the wake of the ruling by the European Parliament's specialist Citizens' Rights and Freedoms, Justice and Home Affairs Committee, a ban on SMS spam will pass into European law following formal approval by the Strasbourg Parliament.
According to members of the Federation of European Direct Marketing (FEDMA), 56 percent of direct marketing across Europe will be carried out by mobile short message services either directly or by third party SMS marketing providers by next year.
Bernadette Lyons, managing director of Mobileway, said the main concern for the European Union is the privacy rights issues involved in SMS spamming.
'As opposed to email spamming, consumers find unsolicited SMS much more personal as the messages are pushed to their mobile phones rather than sitting in an inbox that needs to be accessed proactively.
The medium,' she stressed, 'is more intimate, more intrusive and consumers generally always have their mobiles with them.
Without guidelines, the opportunities created for businesses by SMS services are open to abuse.
' Another aspect of spamming is unwanted intrusion into the users personal space.
One in four children in the United Kingdom have been bullied or threatened through their mobile phone or PC, according to a survey commissioned by British children's charity NCH Location mapping Cell phones are now being built that contain a Global Positioning System (GPS) chip.
That means that as long as it's turned on, the phone "knows" exactly where it is all the time.
In many ways, this feature is quite convenient, e.
g.
to navigate out of an unfamiliar neighbourhood, or provide emergency medical personnel with a signal to respond to.
But..
..
It will be much easier for people, including employers, enemies, and creditors, to track people down.
Also, valuable data about the users habit (which shopping areas they frequent, where they spend their leisure time etc ) could theoretically be sold to marketing companies -- or to anybody else who wants it.
Alan Davidson, of the Center for Democracy & Technology has said,.
"I don't think people realize how available the information is, and how it is already being used.
We've never had a situation where information about the location of millions of people is suddenly readily available, easily and cheaply.
" Hacking and e-security Mobile phones can be hacked, giving criminals access to your data, which increasingly is coming to contain financial access data such as credit card numbers, bank account numbers etc.
It is also possible for criminals to "clone" phones, or for them to steal your phone and modify the chip, allowing your details to be used outside your network area.
Also the very nature of cellular and cordless phones causes them to emit large amounts of Radio Frequency ("RF") energy that can be intercepted, even from large distances.
If an antenna is used then you can bet that it is not secure.
Even the new, so called "secure", digital spread spectrums (eg: TDMA, CDMA, PCS and GSM) make phone tapping easy with some low cost equipment.
Companiesare increasingly having to resort to security codes that prevents a mobile phone from unauthorised use.
The security code is usually supplied with the phone.
And must be changed periodically by the user.
If an invalid code is entered more than 2 or 3 times the phone will "lock".
Technologies like this will have to become more wide spread to increase the public's confidence in the security of their mobiles.
"Big Brother" and e-security The ease of tapping mentioned above has lead to fears that mobile phones can be easily accessed by a government intent on keeping ever closer tabs on it's population.
The Foundation for Information Policy Research's Caspar Bowden said.
"What we are talking about is the invasion of privacy and restriction on civil liberties by this information being available as a tool of surveillance...
(which)...
is like putting an electronic tag on half the population," World wide, there is still little legal protection whatsoever for citizens who object to the collection of data about them..
One privacy expert in the US said: "There are no legal standards governing how the information is handled, or what can be done with it, and what rights people should have to be...
notified of the capability.
All of that is wide-open," In Europe, European law enforcement agencies were recently given sweeping powers to monitor telephone,traffic in a move denounced by critics as the biggest threat to data privacy in a generation.
Employer intrusion Many mobile phone users also use their mobile phone for business use.
Now that wireless text messaging (email, Instant Messaging, SMS, etc.
), voice mail, and traditional phone calls can be supported in a single, handheld wireless device that can be shared for all communication contacts with an individual user, many businesses are requiring access to the "data" on the phone to checkthat "policy" is not being breached.
It may be that to protect themselves from intrusion by their employers, mobile phone users will in future be required to carry two such devices, one for personal contacts, and one for business? Fractured technology The many different standards used so far in building cell phones and networks means building e-security standards will be difficult.
In the United States, half of the 100 million cell phones in use are old-style analog devices running on one type of network.
In the rest of the world, most use digital mobiles on GSM networks.
But even the GSM phones can't all share information.
Users within a single European country often cannot send each other text, or SMS, messages via their mobiles because different carriers use different protocols.
All of this means that unscrupulous individuals can take advantage of the many different ways to access data while security cannot be tightened due to lack of standards.
Summary The privacy problems prevalent in the mobile phone industry need to be addressed, not only at national level, but at international level.
This is unlikely to occur until agreement can be reached on how to implement e-security on phones and phone networks, both on the fractured technology, and in such as a way that a user could have confidence in such security.
S.
Constitution and in the Bills of Rights of other countries around the world..
These principles are recognized by the courts and legislative bodies as "the right to be left alone.
" This right is under increasing pressure with the rapid expansion of technology, the latest mass manifestation of which is in the use of the mobile phone, and the ways in which it can impact on the users personal privacy.
There are several areas where mobile phone usage has impacted on personal privacy SMS Spamming Since mobile usage began to take off, spam via SMS text messages has become one the biggest areas of complaint from users.
But , in Europe at least, in the wake of the ruling by the European Parliament's specialist Citizens' Rights and Freedoms, Justice and Home Affairs Committee, a ban on SMS spam will pass into European law following formal approval by the Strasbourg Parliament.
According to members of the Federation of European Direct Marketing (FEDMA), 56 percent of direct marketing across Europe will be carried out by mobile short message services either directly or by third party SMS marketing providers by next year.
Bernadette Lyons, managing director of Mobileway, said the main concern for the European Union is the privacy rights issues involved in SMS spamming.
'As opposed to email spamming, consumers find unsolicited SMS much more personal as the messages are pushed to their mobile phones rather than sitting in an inbox that needs to be accessed proactively.
The medium,' she stressed, 'is more intimate, more intrusive and consumers generally always have their mobiles with them.
Without guidelines, the opportunities created for businesses by SMS services are open to abuse.
' Another aspect of spamming is unwanted intrusion into the users personal space.
One in four children in the United Kingdom have been bullied or threatened through their mobile phone or PC, according to a survey commissioned by British children's charity NCH Location mapping Cell phones are now being built that contain a Global Positioning System (GPS) chip.
That means that as long as it's turned on, the phone "knows" exactly where it is all the time.
In many ways, this feature is quite convenient, e.
g.
to navigate out of an unfamiliar neighbourhood, or provide emergency medical personnel with a signal to respond to.
But..
..
It will be much easier for people, including employers, enemies, and creditors, to track people down.
Also, valuable data about the users habit (which shopping areas they frequent, where they spend their leisure time etc ) could theoretically be sold to marketing companies -- or to anybody else who wants it.
Alan Davidson, of the Center for Democracy & Technology has said,.
"I don't think people realize how available the information is, and how it is already being used.
We've never had a situation where information about the location of millions of people is suddenly readily available, easily and cheaply.
" Hacking and e-security Mobile phones can be hacked, giving criminals access to your data, which increasingly is coming to contain financial access data such as credit card numbers, bank account numbers etc.
It is also possible for criminals to "clone" phones, or for them to steal your phone and modify the chip, allowing your details to be used outside your network area.
Also the very nature of cellular and cordless phones causes them to emit large amounts of Radio Frequency ("RF") energy that can be intercepted, even from large distances.
If an antenna is used then you can bet that it is not secure.
Even the new, so called "secure", digital spread spectrums (eg: TDMA, CDMA, PCS and GSM) make phone tapping easy with some low cost equipment.
Companiesare increasingly having to resort to security codes that prevents a mobile phone from unauthorised use.
The security code is usually supplied with the phone.
And must be changed periodically by the user.
If an invalid code is entered more than 2 or 3 times the phone will "lock".
Technologies like this will have to become more wide spread to increase the public's confidence in the security of their mobiles.
"Big Brother" and e-security The ease of tapping mentioned above has lead to fears that mobile phones can be easily accessed by a government intent on keeping ever closer tabs on it's population.
The Foundation for Information Policy Research's Caspar Bowden said.
"What we are talking about is the invasion of privacy and restriction on civil liberties by this information being available as a tool of surveillance...
(which)...
is like putting an electronic tag on half the population," World wide, there is still little legal protection whatsoever for citizens who object to the collection of data about them..
One privacy expert in the US said: "There are no legal standards governing how the information is handled, or what can be done with it, and what rights people should have to be...
notified of the capability.
All of that is wide-open," In Europe, European law enforcement agencies were recently given sweeping powers to monitor telephone,traffic in a move denounced by critics as the biggest threat to data privacy in a generation.
Employer intrusion Many mobile phone users also use their mobile phone for business use.
Now that wireless text messaging (email, Instant Messaging, SMS, etc.
), voice mail, and traditional phone calls can be supported in a single, handheld wireless device that can be shared for all communication contacts with an individual user, many businesses are requiring access to the "data" on the phone to checkthat "policy" is not being breached.
It may be that to protect themselves from intrusion by their employers, mobile phone users will in future be required to carry two such devices, one for personal contacts, and one for business? Fractured technology The many different standards used so far in building cell phones and networks means building e-security standards will be difficult.
In the United States, half of the 100 million cell phones in use are old-style analog devices running on one type of network.
In the rest of the world, most use digital mobiles on GSM networks.
But even the GSM phones can't all share information.
Users within a single European country often cannot send each other text, or SMS, messages via their mobiles because different carriers use different protocols.
All of this means that unscrupulous individuals can take advantage of the many different ways to access data while security cannot be tightened due to lack of standards.
Summary The privacy problems prevalent in the mobile phone industry need to be addressed, not only at national level, but at international level.
This is unlikely to occur until agreement can be reached on how to implement e-security on phones and phone networks, both on the fractured technology, and in such as a way that a user could have confidence in such security.
Source...