First there was Friendster, then MySpace and Facebook. The original triumvirate of social network sites. They were hubs to connect people. Friends, musicians, college friends, you name it. We’ve all flocked to social media sites to keep track of our friends, our neighbors, our high school crushes and our favorite sports, movie and television stars.
Then came Twitter and Identi.ca. New social sites to connect people and ideas. (You can toss YouTube and Flickr in here somewhere, the time-line isn’t important.) You can read short messages from people you know or people you don’t know.
Now, following Foursquare, these sites are looking to add something extra. The GPS location of where you and your friends are at. With millions of people using social media and location-based services, including handy sites like Yelp, maybe we should ask ourselves one important questions: what’s the deal with location-based services?
The Benefits of Location-Based Services
Location-based services are a double-edged sword. If used properly, it’s a great way to share what you’re doing and where you’re at. Check-in on Foursquare at your favorite restaurant and maybe your friends will show up because they didn’t know where to have dinner and your update kicked them in gear. Maybe you want some friends to join you for a jog down the Pier? Check-in, send an update and now they know exactly where to be. Use Yelp or sites like it and you can find ATMs, restaurants, auto mechanics, you name it, near your location. This sort of “augmented reality” is quite beneficial for the consumer.
Samples of things you can find with location-based services:
- Restaurants
- Parks / Zoos
- ATMs and Banking Facilities
- Retail Stores
The Downside of Location-Based Services
On the other edge of the sword, the downside of location-based services: your privacy. Broadcasting your location to the Internet can be dangerous. There are reasons that people are careful with whom they share their address. Post an update from your house or apartment on from your cellphone and it’s tagged with the GPS coordinates. No need for an address, someone can track you to ten feet of where you sent it. It’s worse than just knowing the apartment complex you living or housing subdivision.
- Stalkers
- Identify Thieves
- Burglars/Thieves
Most people don’t realize that digital cameras, including those on cellphones, embed data in the picture, including the type of picture, what camera took the picture and, if applicable, the GPS location. This is great for sites that want to use your pictures for “virtual tours” but not so good if that picture is publicly indexed on the Internet. Anyone can extract the GPS data and look up the latitude and longitude to determine where it was taken. This may not be such a good idea if someone wants to track your movements.
Does the good outweigh the bad?
The answer is based on the user. Location-based services have a great benefit to the consumer. It makes finding something much easier and requires little effort to use an application on a cellphone. Are there safety concerns? Undoubtedly, we just haven’t heard of anything SERIOUS yet. It’s only a matter of time. It doesn’t have to be a stalker finding your information, the possibility exists that a hacker could gain access to the information and use it for identity theft by mimicking your patterns and activities, finding where you shop and waiting for their opportunity.
I admit that I use most of these services, I’m just diligent about what I update and who I share it with.
How To Protect Yourself
Steps to protecting your personal information are common sense.
- Limit what you share
- Share with only people you know
- Be a user of Location-Based Services and not a contributor
- Filter information before you send it
These are fairly straight forward actions you can do to protect yourself. If you don’t want people to know, don’t share it. Share sensitive personal information to only people you know. (There’s a reason I only have friends on social networks that I actually “know.”) Use location-based services but limit when you share your location. Proactively review what you’re sharing so that you don’t let something slip you don’t want the public to know. (That goes for your keg-stand pictures that you don’t want your boss or future boss to see.)
There are pros and cons to location-based information. Protect yourself and use common sense. Privacy is only an illusion and controlling that illusion is up to you.
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