Internet Privacy: Tracking and Filtering, a Policy Question PP290: Information Technology and Public Policy | Jason Christopher and Prof. Michael O’Hare, GSPP Tuesday, 30 August Ideas

Administrative Any questions from last time? Forthcoming addition to the syllabus: final paper o Pick a organization, company, institution, govt. agency … from a (policy) field of interest such as, healthcare, renewable energy, finance, etc. Do an analysis of the IT components of the organization and its integration with the organization---past, present, future--- specifically discussing the pros and cons of maintaining the IT infrastructure and IT projects. Include in your analysis a discussion of costs and IT alternatives. Jason’s Office Hours o Monday 2:00 -4:00 o Friday 2:00 – 4:00 o Or by appointment

Discussion Points What is the internet? What is the web? What is the distinction between the two? Hint: system v. service Broadcast, narrowcast, democratized news media What is the “killer app” of the web? What is an internet cookie? How does it work? What are third-party cookies and why are they a threat to privacy? What is internet tracking? What is internet filtering? *Theme: Unintended Consequences

Internet and Web internet: network of interconnected networks. “Traffic” on the network follows agreed upon rules to keep the flow going. o IP (internet protocol) for addressing | *ping | *public and private addressing in briefwww.cnn.com o DNS (Doman Name System) names to numbers, a phonebook web: a global set of documents connected by hyperlinks using the hypertext transfer protocol ( HTTP )|a “service” that runs on the internet. There are many other services that use the internet. Ex. E- mail, DHCP o PC: open command window; at *command prompt, type: ipconfig, the ipconfig /all, ipconfig /release, ipconfig /renew Protocols use ports | 0 to | HTTP 80

Browsing the Web Your web browser of preference… nytimes.com: 80 Page sample: What are the economics of pages/sites? How is it funded? Browser: view page source at nytimes.com Find “singleAD” on page Logging on to a site, your account information… o Login nytimes.com Try other sites, look for adds in the page source

Advertising Revenue Ex. |$15mil company paying $50K/month to Google for add servicewww.zenni.com

Tracking: Cookie Tech 101 Allows for increasingly targeted advertising and loss of privacy. Are there any potential gains? An “ever-growing data- base” of you! For how long? …My IP address, but what if I am on a private net- work? Leakage and taking control Browser: find third-party cookies and control on your favorite browser…

Public Policy Do people have ownership over their private information? Consumer control: turn off third-party cookies, don’t use Gmail? Do Not Track – StanfordDo Not Track Should government step in? o Consumers don’t know that information is being collected o The danger of data being combined… “ever-growing database” o Competition among advertising platforms may not result in optimal provision of privacy

Filtering: Not just Adds… Filters that show the internet the way we want to see it, including the news Ex. Google, NY Times, Washington Post Experiment: Search for “Egypt” Facebook: Relevance to you! “When the result is that our favorite pizza parlor shows up first when we Google pizza, it’s useful. But when the result is that we only see the information that is aligned with our religious or social or political beliefs, it’s difficult to maintain perspective.” ---Eli Pariser, Board President and former Executive Director of MoveOn.org

For Next Time Lab session: “Hardware: Getting to Know Your Electronic Cadaver”

Your Moment of Zen