How do we solve falling trust in online services before it becomes critical?

A few days ago LinkedIn launched its latest IOS app, Intro.



The app promises to integrate LinkedIn profile content directly into emails, allowing more rapid connections and helping give email recipients access to a range of relevant information about the sender.



Given both Apple and LinkedIn are well-known brands, many people are likely to trust that this app is safe for them to use, that these two global companies have taken every step to ensure that users are not exposed to privacy risks.



It's also not a big decision. Intro is free and installing the app is a two-click process, done in under 30 seconds. People are unlikely to spend the time to look at the usage policy in detail, or consider the impact of such a simple decision when they trust the brands.



However, in this case, trusting LinkedIn and Apple may not be wise. Global Security Consultancy Bishop Fox released a very compelling post outlining serious concerns with how LinkedIn's new app works.



According to Bishop Fox, the app works in the same way as a 'man in the middle' hacking attack, by sending all of a user's emails through LinkedIn's mail servers. Here they could be read by LinkedIn or, if encrypted, this process could stop the final recipient from ever receiving the email.



LinkedIn states that it will keep information from the emails it captures - and while it states that LinkedIn “will never sell, rent, or give away private data about you or your contacts.” there's no clarification of what data LinkedIn might consider private, nor any solid information on how LinkedIn has mitigated against the type of security breach it suffered in 2012.



This is just a single instance of a situation where the public are being asked to trust a company to do the right thing online, while there's no guarantee they will, and often there's few ways for an individual, organisation or even a government to hold a company to account when they fail to keep their end of the trust bargain.



So the conundrum for the public has become, who can they trust online?



Clearly there must be a level of trust to use online systems, with banks and government clear cases of where trust relationships are critical for transactions and service provision. With no trust in online systems, online banking and egovernment could not exist.



Social networks are also important. As places where people store personal information and share more and more of it over time, there's a clear requirement for companies to appear trustworthy and safe.



Even search engines, which have become the front door to most websites (with Google the dominant player), have a huge trail of data on their users - what you search for helps define who you are, particularly when people use search for medical and personal matters.



The public must implicitly trust all these organisations to both play nice with their personal information and to secure it such that nefarious groups or individuals don't get it. However it has become very clear that they simply can't.



Whether it is commercial providers, who primarily use this data to identify more effective ways to sell, or governments and banks who require this data to validate individuals, the number of reported data breaches is rising - in a global environment where few governments legally require companies to report breaches to the people potentially impacted.



On top of this comes revelations of data surveillance operations by government agencies, such as the NSA, commercial entities such as the example from LinkedIn above, where the data helps them productise their users, or organised crime, who use hackers and insider sources to secure valuable data for use and resale.



However despite increasing concern over how data is secured, who can access it and how it will be used, individuals continue to use many of these online services, either because they simply cannot live their normal lives, or conduct business, without using them, or because of the "it won't happen to me" principle.



If public trust disappears, what does that mean for every organisation using the internet to build its business or to provide more convenient and cost-efficient services?



What impact would it have on government, where a shift to electronic transactions means less investment in other channels and, over time, less capability to meet citizen needs should a collapse in online trust occur?



I don't know how this situation can be resolved, particularly with the low attention paid to ensuring organisations report and rectify data breaches and be clear on how they will secure and use data.



While it is a global issue, individual governments can have an impact, by establishing a robust privacy framework for their citizens and recognising that people own their own data and any organisation allowed access to it should be held accountable for not securing or using it appropriately.



Do we have such a regime in Australia today?



I wanted to finish with an extract from the response I received from the Australian Privacy Commissioner when I reported the LinkedIn app using their email form:

Dear Craig  

Thank you for your enquiry.  

The Office of the Australian Information Commissioner (OAIC) receives a large quantity of written enquiries each day. An representative will be assigned to your enquiry and will be in contact soon. 

We aim to respond to all written enquiries within ten working days. 

If your enquiry is urgent and requires an immediate response, please telephone us on 1300 363 992 and quote your reference number. More complex phone enquiries may require a written response and may still take some time.

A response within 10 working days (14 actual days).



I wonder how many individuals may have their privacy breached, or organisations their confidential data exposed, by a single popular mobile app from a well-known company in this period of time.

eGov AU

Craig Thomler's personal Gov 2.0 and eGovernment thoughts and speculations from an Australian perspective

Ying and Yang

I felt the need to write this article after hearing Historian David Starkey’s comments“ The Whites have become Black” which he expressed on Friday 12^th August on Newsnight. The riots and looting that took place regionally involved all races yet somehow Starkey’s finger of blame is being directed solely with one group of people. Black people and their “perceived” culture.  

Starkey is a historian and one who clearly picks and chooses what aspects of findings he wants to use to push his argument and agenda, which is narrow minded and offensive. Yes Black culture has been influential in England but also across the world in positive ways from food, music and clothes, though Starkey seems to blame black culture for the change in language and so much more. He said "This language which is wholly false, which is this Jamaican patois that’s been intruded in England, and this is why so many of us have this sense of literally a foreign country".  Now we all know this statement is not true so I do not feel the need to break it down to discredit his argument. 

He went on to say “Listen to David Lammy, an archetypical successful black man, if you turned the screen off so you were listening to him on radio you’d think he was white." I am not sure what point he was trying to make but clearly anyone who speaks like him must represent who he believes he is, which is intelligent, educated and civilised. Making the David Lammy comparison would also imply that he is somehow different from other Black people. The overall tone was Us vs. Them, maintaining the greater than (Superiority) and Less than (Inferiority) tone. "The Whites have become Blacks.” As I repeat this again and again to find some sort of clarity of what he means, I hit a dead end each time. What does he mean? He mentions Chav’s so am I to assume that chavs are the new Blacks? Either way his comments are offensive in the same way as...

Starkey also said it’s not about skin colour it’s culture and then proceeds to mention Black culture. Culture is ideals, beliefs, art, literature etc of particular groups. The group he is choosing to focus on is Black, so how is his statement not about skin colour and therefore ‘race’?

Language is important and so are labels. Both are powerful in both conscious and unconscious ways. Recent developments in the analysis of DNA, confirms that the concept of ‘race’ is a constructed one, with no objective basis in biology. This concept as well as the notions of ‘Black’ and ‘White’ were imposed by the colonial powers. Rustin (1991) said, “It is both an empty category and one of the most powerful forms of social categorization” (Rustin, p.57). Categorising a group of people puts people in brackets and furthers the tone of hierarchy and rank. Colour terminology for ‘race’, the categorisation of people based on the colour of their skin, serves the same purpose.  Black and white it isn’t, as no other group of people are defined or referred to by skin colour and no other colours in the spectrum of colours, has such diverse symbolic, metaphorical, cultural connotations attached to it (Lago & Smith, 2003).

Like the Chinese Ying and Yang symbol, black and white are seen as direct opposites of each other. However there strengths are individually celebrated and when viewed as a whole this symbol represents harmony and balance. In society these colours, which “identify” the ‘race’ of a group of people, seem only to encapsulate the separateness, conflict and a good vs. bad dualism.

It is this good Vs. Bad dualism that Starkey promotes within his Us vs. Them stance. Philosopher Martin Buber spoke of I/It and I/thou which furthers my point.   I-Thou is a relationship of mutuality and reciprocity, while I-It is a relationship of separateness and detachment. As a result Starkey chooses to see “Black culture” as the problem here, even though the rioters and looters were off all ‘races’. He chooses to see what he wants to, and what he sees taps into the belief he already holds. The other members on the panel Dreda Say Mitchell and the author of Chavs Owen Jones made some great comments offering a diverse and wider perspective to Starkey’s narrow minded view, but were continually interrupted.

Starkey claimed it was the "destructive, nihilistic gangster culture'' which he said ''has become the fashion” to help explain the looters actions. The levels of consumerism has risen and with it greed. How can this “nihilistic gangster culture” be dumped at the door of one specific group? The rich and poor divide is widening, socio and economic factors need to be included as the rise in celebrity culture and so much more. When did being a gangster become synonymous with being black or part of the black culture? “Gangster culture” has been around for decades. Cowboys and Indians, Scarface, The Godfather, The Krays and even The Mitchell Brothers in EastEnders for example, all have glorified violence, wealth, control and power, so isn't this more to do with media glorification than black culture?

Psychologist Ellis (2004) said “When white society ignores their own basic feelings and need, black society have been programmed over centuries to take care of white society needs” (p.4). Alleyne extends this point by expressing “Black people continue to carry the transgenerational and intergenerational pain of their collective past, but also the burden of the other’s hidden shame and their own silent witnessing” (Alleyne, 2005, p.295). ‘Race’, difference and diversity stares us all in the face, yet as individuals we have all been conditioned to avoid it, and so the question of why never gets the attention it deserves. ‘Race’ is hard to look at especially within its historical context, this is an important acknowledgement and for me begins to explain why people with views like Starkey find it easier to place the blame elsewhere.

Lowe (2008) hits the nail on the head by acknowledging ‘race’ as paranoid-schizoid splits. Projective identification created centuries ago, deemed whites as the desirable superior aspect of the self and blacks as the inferior undesirable aspects hence the good vs. bad dualism. Gomez (Cited in Lowe) said “Demons are easily made when we identify with one side of a split’ . . . we are prone to externalize what we cannot bear within, terrified of seeing ourselves like the groups we repudiate”. (2008, p.20).

                                                            

                                                                              1. self                           2.Other  

 Pic: Individual 1. projects or expels ‘internal’ objects from within itself whilst the other ‘internalises’ or has

 them projected ‘into’ them.                                   

It is easier to lay blame with the Other than to turn the same finger to self to look at self. As I said there are many factors involved within the events that took place over a week ago. Starkey’s comments are lazy, offensive and an abuse of his knowledge.

Given that relations between black and white groups over several centuries have been typified by oppression, exploitation and discrimination, how might contemporary relationships be transformed into creative (rather than further damaging) experiences? Referring back to the Chinese Ying and Yang symbol, both the perceived opposite aspects of self need to be embraced.

However Sampson (Cited in Alleyne, 2004) illustrates “The Other [Black person] is an essential presence without whom the protagonist could not be who they claim to be” (Alleyne, 2004, p.50), the risk therefore may be too great. Society, ‘race’, psychotherapy and so much more, as we know it would be revealed to be nothing more than a construct based on false beliefs. So whilst discussion need not come from a place of blame but open mindedness, understanding and acceptance, the risk may be too great to bear. It is this which stops progression.  

This is not about Black culture it is about Blame culture. Blame perpetuates a dysfunctional cycle. To move forward everyone needs to look at all the factors involved and that includes the government and police who are currently finger pointing each other. If they all came together the solution of how to move forward could be found. Those who committed acts of crime need to look at themselves and take responsibility for their actions. Everyone had a choice and in that moment they made theirs. What occurred extended beyond class, and 'race' and it is important that those who comment on these events remind themselves of this. 


References: 
Rustin, M. (1991). Psychoanalysis, racism and anti-racism. In the Good society and the inner world. London: Verco.


Lago, C., & Smith, B. (Eds.). (2003). Anti-discriminatory practice. London, UK:Sage.


Ellis, B. (2004). Using Macrocosm to understand the Microcosm. Black therapist, White client. Politics in the therapy room. 


Alleyne, A. (2005). Invisible injuries and silent witnesses: The shadow of racial oppression in workplace contexts. 


Lowe, F. (2008). Colonial Object Relations: Going underground Black-White Relationships. 

Alleyne, A. (2004). The internal oppressor and black identity wounding. 

© Lisa Bent 2011

Invisible but felt

I woke up this morning bright eyed, bushytailed and ...one year older. Still felt the same. I mean it’s a given, as you get older the numbers go up, no brainer right? This blazayness evaporated when I hit the gym. I typed in 31 into the cross trainer for the first time and my eyes widened at the harsh red numbers staring back at me. “Oh My God where the hell did time go?”

They say “You are as old as you feel” well I still feel like an excited 26 year old, however these two particular digits filled me with a tinge of dread and I have never felt this way on my birthday before. Feeling guilty, ungrateful and uneasy, I decided to abandon the machinery and seek a different kind of sweat ...in the steam room.30 minutes later I emerged with a light head, sweated out hair, gasping for water and a greater sense of clarity to my mini traumatic crisis....

It is invisible, always there, but you can feel it. I am talking about society’s unspoken expectations. At 31 years old I feel I am expected to have children, a boyfriend/husband/fiancé, mortgage and maybe a dog, cat or even goldfish. I do not tick any of the above and I am okay with it, though the dread this morning was an unconscious response to expectations and all the things that I don’t have. I had to shake it off by reminding myself that I am single by choice and whilst I may not have ticked these particular boxes, I have ticked others.

Single status is a normal process of life, yet in society it feels as though it is instantly seen as a bad thing and one which somehow makes a statement about you and your inability to attract the opposite sex, which is absolute nonsense. Splashed in the gossip magazines we see the ever changing statuses of, for example Halle Berry, Jennifer Aniston and Jordan. Shows like Sex and the City (which I love ) and Cougar Town enforce the same ideas. When things go wrong what do they do? They diet, get a haircut, sexy outfit and hit the town, in an attempt to show the last partner what they are missing. This is denial in all its desperate glory.

As single women, they seem irrational, emotional and depressed, whilst in relationships they seem confident, sexy and happy. Is this life imitating art or vice versa? Either way, I feel the majority of singletons have adopted these ways of being as their own. Being single does not naturally equate to doom and unhappiness, just as Black +female +single doesn’t = “difficult”. But I guess like anything it is how we, you, I perceive it. I am very happy. Rather than looking at what I don’t have right now, I am grateful for what I do have and have done and experienced, whilst excited about what is on its way. I think it’s a shame that so many single women give up their power to make themselves happy and instead choose to pass the buck to someone else.

Is the grass really greener on the otherside? I’m sure there are pluses and minus on both sides, the key however seems to be, to live in the moment and enjoy where you are at. And if you’re not enjoying it, then you have a choice in what happens next. Culture, media and beliefs for example, are ideas that we adopted from very early on, however how much of these beliefs do we really agree with now? Or have obliviously taken on as our own, which directs, on an unconscious level our happiness? I say this because had I not thought about it, I could have spent my birthday in a depressed state because of society’s obsession with age and status, which would have been a damn shame. With obsession comes fear and so many people seem to be fearful of being alone. As my mum says “You come into this world alone, you go out alone so it makes sense to know yourself and love yourself” I could not have put it better.

They say two halves make a whole. I personally prefer to be whole before I meet my other half. Thank God for my mum and Iyanla Vanzant, they both taught me well. I would love to see a person in the public eye, a celebrity change the record and sing from a different hymn sheet to help empower both women and men. Being single and getting older should not be seen as some kind of dirty word that many are apologetic or embarrassed over. Let’s change it up and make it the new “Black”.

So from one singleton to others I say...

There is nothing wrong with being single. Embrace your freedom. Stand up and be counted. Wear your singleton status with pride and use the time alone “In the meantime” or “In the valley” to re-connect/define who you are and what you want. And trust that nothing for you will pass you!

A new day is a new blessing. Tomorrow is not guaranteed and so today, right now is all we have, for which I am truly grateful.

It’ s my birthday, I am 31, black, single and proud!

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