Page 415 - Introduction to Electronic Commerce and Social Commerce

Case 12.2: EC Application: School Administrators Used Webcams to Spy on Students at Home 403

Privacy Issues in Web 2.0 Tools and Social Government Spying on Its Citizens
Networks
At issue here is the proper balance between personal privacy
The rise in social network use raises some special issues of and national security, whereby innovation and commerce is
privacy and free speech. Here are a few examples. not stifled. The claim is that social networking sites have tech-
nology that has outpaced government law enforcement capa-
Presence, Location-Based Systems, and Privacy bilities. The laws on the books do not cover new communication
methods (i.e., texting and social networking). Opponents see
Establishing real-time connections in the social networking this as nothing more than unbridled government eavesdrop-
world is an important activity. For example, Facebook offers ping. During 2013 and 2014, it was found that the U.S. gov-
Nearby Friends, an app that enables users to know where their ernment did spy on its citizens. In 2014 and 2015, efforts
friends are. were taken to minimize such government surveillance.
IBM has presence capabilities in its Lotus Software
Connections (now called IBM Connections; ibm.com/soft- P3P Privacy Platform
ware/products/en/conn), while Microsoft offers similar
cap abilities with SharePoint (office.microsoft.com/en-us/ The Platform for Privacy Preferences Project (P3P) is a
sharepoint). Apple, Google, and other companies offer similar protocol for privacy protection on the Web developed by the
features. Several social networks enable people to share their World Wide Web Consortium (W3C). According to W3C, an
location with others. What are the privacy implications of international standards organization for the Web, the
such capabilities if used by businesses to locate customers “Platform for Privacy Preferences Project (P3P) enables web-
and goods? Who will be held responsible or legally liable sites to express their privacy practices in a standard format

for unforeseen harm resulting from so much awareness and that can be retrieved automatically and interpreted easily by
connectivity? user agents” (per w3.org/P3P). The W3C also explains that
Obviously, clear policies are needed to govern what social P3P is useful because “P3P uses machine readable descrip-
networks can do with all the data they collect about people. tions to describe the collection and use of data. Sites imple-
menting such policies make their practices explicit and thus
open them to public scrutiny.” This exposure can increase
Privacy Protection by Ethical Principles users’ trust and confidence in e-commerce sites and vendors.
Figure 12.2 shows the process of P3P.
Some ethical principles that exist for the collection and use
of personal information also apply to information collected
in e-commerce. Examples are: proper notification about the Privacy Protection in Countries Other
possible use of personal data, option of opting-in and/or than the United States
opting- out, accessibility to stored data, keeping consumers’
data secured, and the ability to enforce related policies. In 1998, the European Union passed a privacy directive
The broadest law in scope is the Communications Privacy (EU Data Protection Directive) reaffirming the principles of
and Consumer Empowerment Act (1997), which requires, personal data protection in the Internet age. This directive
among other things, that the FTC enforces online privacy protects privacy more than U.S. protection laws do.
rights in EC, including the collection and use of personal data. In many countries, the debate about the rights of the indi-
For the status of pending legislation in the United States, see vidual versus the rights of society continues. In some coun-
govtrack.us/congress/bills/subjects/right_of_privacy/ tries, like China, there is little protection of an individual’s
5910. Internet privacy.

Figure 12.2 How P3P works
1 http GET request P3P policy files

2 Send P3P policy files

3 http GET request Web page
Web Server
5

4 send Web page display page and
policy to user