Facebook Meta Hiring Slowdown Is A Warning To Email Marketing

 

 Facebook plans to reduce hiring.

From CNBC.com

"Wehner reiterated to investors that privacy changes Apple instituted on its iOS devices last year will hurt growth, after the company had already predicted the move would reduce revenue this year by $10 billion."

Those "privacy changes" are impacting more companies and industries than just Facebook.

Not only do they prevent Facebook from tracking users across their apps on the iPhone, but the new privacy features will have enormous ramifications for email marketing companies.

“Mail Privacy Protection hides your IP address, so senders can’t link it to your other online activity or determine your location. 

And it prevents senders from seeing if and when you’ve opened their email.” Apple

It basically sends an email into a "holding tank" so it appears that EVERY email has been opened.

Read more about Apple's email privacy solution. 

 

How To Be Completely Anonymous On The Internet

Think you're private and secure when you use a VPN, Tor or the Brave browser? Think again.

If your browser runs on your computer (instead of in the cloud) data is sent from your computer to a site and data from a site is sent to your computer.

You cannot be private or secure unless you use the only virtual private browser TraceFree.

How To Tell If You're Private Online

We hear mainstream media recommending different applications and services for online privacy. Most of these outlets are wrong and it’s frustrating to see the public be mislead.

There are 2 ways to determine how “private” your private online solution is.

The first way to know is the easiest. Is It Free?

You’ve heard the expression, “if it’s free, you’re not the consumer, you’re the product”. Well that's very true. Remember in the early days of the Internet when all the critics were asking’ “How will these free sites make money?” Now we know how

For starters, your browser was free wasn’t it? It either came with your device or you could download it for free. This amazing tool that lets you access so much information is free? How do you think a software company that had to pay to build that browser stays in business? How do you think they can afford to make updates? Your “free” browser knows EVERY search you made, every site you visited, every email you read/sent. Sounds pretty costly now doesn’t it?

So you surf in Incognito Mode? How much did you pay to use that? That free ad blocker program keeps you private right?

Now let’s look at all of those wonderful sites that let you do so many great things, for free. You can get just about any question answered by asking Google. You can share your thoughts and pictures with your friends on Facebook. You can play doctor by asking WebMD medical questions. You can communicate with anyone with email. Hmmm, those are all free aren't they?

That “private” search engine doesn’t share your search queries right? It really doesnt matter if they do or not, because your browser, your Internet provider and the sites you visit will be able to identify you, your device and know what you searched for. Private search engines are one of the biggest online myths out there and yet the media still advises the public to use them.

“Free” WiFi? Have you ever wondered how those retail stores that were struggling before, are now able to do so well after free WiFi was offered? You paid a couple bucks for a cup of coffee and then logged into THEIR website to accept their terms and conditions for their “free” WiFi service. Your device touched their website. What other establishment would let you take up space for hours without purchasing something. You are the product baby.

“One person, one cup, one neighborhood at a time”...doesn’t sound so wholesome now does it?

With each click, search, surf, email, post etc you are allowing every site and ISP to know more about you. If they aren’t leaving identifiers (cookies) on your device, they are reading the ones that are already there. With these identifiers that can build a very extensive profile of you.

The second way you can determine how “private” you really are. One of the best websites we know of is www.whatismybrowser.com This site gives you a complete rundown of your device on their site. It analyzes your OS, browser and all of the functions your browser has.

What we hope you can see here is that it PROVES that if their site can see, touch and identify your device, then ANY site can. When a website can see and touch your device it can identify you by the numerous cookies on your device. If the site is friendly you will probably only receive more cookies and be tracked online. If the site isn’t friendly, you could get a virus, be tracked and or locked out of your computer. Either way, all the info from your device will be sold and you have no idea to who.

Our next blog will show you How To Be Private Online

France Has A Problem With Facebook And Their Whatsapp Privacy

When you understand that EVERY application on your phone can see every other app, your contacts and activity (calls, texts, pics, location, email, messages) of your phone, you will be more careful of which "free" apps you download.

France’s data privacy watchdog may fine messaging app WhatsApp if it does not comply with an order to bring its sharing of user data with parent company Facebook (FB.O) into line with French privacy law.

“The only way to refuse the data transfer for “business intelligence” purpose is to uninstall the application,” the CNIL said in a statement. 

Trumps Signs Bill Letting ISPs See and Share Your Browsing History

Trump officially ended online privacy rules.

Internet providers will not have to ask permission before sharing sensitive data with advertisers.

Many are saying to use a VPN to keep your online browsing from being seen by your ISP but that isn't true. The truth is, if your browser runs on your device, you cannot have complete privacy and security. Cookies and viruses can still touch and see your device. Sites can track you from site to site while you use a VPN too. VPNs have many cons.

How can you keep your online privacy? Use a cloud browser.

Cloud browsers are the wave of the future. 

Your true location is hidden, history, cookies, and viruses stay isolated from you and your device.

Personal computing is and has shifted to the cloud. Applications run in the cloud NOT on the device.

Shouldn't your browser do the same?

 

House Passes Resolution Making ISPs More Powerful Than Google And Facebook.

 Your online privacy just went out the window.

As I have been saying for a while, the cable box in your house knows more about you than any website.

They know what web searches you made, sites you visited, your downloads, your emails. They know what you liked on Facebook. They know what texts/pics you shared on your apps.

They know what TV shows you recorded, when and where you watched them. They know what you were doing with your other devices while you were watching TV.

Sure you can clear your cookies and history on your web browser, but that doesn't stop the cable company from following your online activity because they control the pipe. They can even monitor you when you surf on another provider. * There is only one way I know you can hide your Internet traffic from your provider.

Why the cable companies haven't capitalized on this goldmine is beyond me...well now they can.

Today the GOP just killed consumer broadband privacy protections.

The House of Representatives today voted 215 to 205 to kill privacy rules protecting US broadband subscribers. If you're interested in a little thing called public accountability, you can find a breakdown of which Representatives voted for the measure here. The rules, approved by the FCC last fall, were slated to take effect this month.

Today's vote came after the Senate voted 50-48 last week to kill the rules.

Google To Purge Millions Of Apps From Play Store...For Privacy?

 As if anyone ever reads the tiny print privacy policy. Apparently Google feels that if you don't have one publicly, they will purge your app from their store.

Over the last 24 hours, Google has been sending notices to developers worldwide stating its intention to “limit visibility” or remove apps from the Play Store that violate the company’s User Data policy.

For most devs, the violation seems to be a simple one: lack of a privacy policy.

App developers have until March 15 to make the privacy policy addition, or Google warns “administrative action will be taken to limit the visibility of your app, up to and including removal from the Play Store.” 

The truth is, once you download an app, the app owner and ALL of the other apps on your device, know. Your device becomes a cesspool with each app sharing info.

And it isn't just privacy, it's permissions too. Some apps not only have access to the info on your device BUT can also control the hardware (camera).

Keeping applications in the cloud, and not on your device, would go a long way of helping with privacy and permission issues.

Dropbox Rolls Out Google Docs Competitor..Keep This In Mind

Dropbox is launching a public version of its new Paper service to make a name for itself among collaborative productivity suite providers such as Google Docs and Microsoft's Office 365.


Paper, which has been available in beta since last year, is aiming to win converts from the big names in the space with a user interface that the company said makes collaboration between coworkers easier. The cloud-based platform will allow users to manage shared documents by assigning different tasks and deadlines to various collaborators.

Here's the questions I have.

If you own a physical storage unit, would you allow the owner of the development to go inside it anytime they want? Would you let them share what is inside to the public?

Do you realize anything created and stored inside these public storage sites is THEIR property, not yours?

What is the company's policy if proprietary material is on this site?

Something to think about.

What Other Ways Can You think Of To Stay Off The Grid By Using The Grid?

On the TV show Hunted, where contestants try to avoid capture for 28 days, one group tries to stay off the grid by using the grid in a special way.

The guys create a Gmail account that is just numbers and letters (ed8x$4dds@gmail.com) and then sends letters (with no return address) to friends with their code names. Once again the code names are random.

One thing I never knew is that the Government scans EVERY piece of mail..

The guys create DRAFT emails for each person with their code name. Their friends can communicate with them by continuing the DRAFT email and never sending it. An email that is never sent cannot be tracked.

Eventually their own paranoia gets the best of them.

Can you think of ways to use the Net without being tracked?

Does This Concern You?

 

 

New York plans to install vast system of facial recognition cameras that matches drivers licenses to social media accounts at bridges and tunnels.

Facebook already has face tagging and Check In feature. Can you imagine the opportunity for  Snapchat?

As Eli Pariser writes in the book The Filter Bubble (highly recommended), "the ability to search by face will shatter many of our cultural illusions about privacy and anonymity"

Here is what is REALLY scary?

A while ago Facebook cut a deal with political website Politico that allows the independent site machine-access to Facebook users' messages, both public and private. 

Facebook already bought WhatsApp for $19B, Will they buy SnapChat before they go public?

As soon as Facebook finds a way to tie in commerce to the platform, it's game over.

I can't help thinking this has gotten out of control.  How did this get so bad so quick?

Those "Privacy Policy" pages that are never read, have created such lasting damage.

So how do we stop it?  

The Next Big Thing is Privacy. Stuart Langridge has the right idea.

Privacy will define the next major change in computing.

The way you beat an incumbent is by coming up with a thing that people want, that you do, and that your competitors can’t do. Not won’t. Can’t.

How do you beat Google and Facebook? 

By inventing a thing that they can’t compete against. By making privacy your core goal. Because companies who have built their whole business model on monetising your personal information cannot compete against that. They’d have to give up on everything that they are, which they can’t do. Facebook altering itself to ensure privacy for its users… wouldn’t exist. Can’t exist.

The company who works out how to convince people that privacy is important will define the next five years of technology. (source)

Mainframe, PC, Cloud Computing..what is next?  Private Computing? A Private Internet?

The technological advances we have made just in the last 5 years makes me think that it is possible to get back our privacy. It will happen when people have their own data used against themselves.

When one day they wake up and say "How did they know that?".  That's the "A Ha!" moment.

Watch the TV show The Hunted, to see how public you really are.

Big problems lead to Big Solutions.

 

What Happens With The Death Of Cash?

The days of cash being accepted as legal tender are quickly coming to an end. Within a decade, cash will be dead.

Have you ever given thought to the ramifications to this?

What happens when cash is no longer accepted as a form of payment? When you are forced to use digital currency to make ANY type of payment say good bye to your last bit of privacy.

When Chase Bank started their new "Cash Policy", it started a wave that will soon eliminate the last bit of privacy consumers have.

Think of all of the people and consumer items affected.

Buying items that you don't want, or can't have identified on your credit card, will be gone. (from embarrassing drug store items to those funny cigarettes). 

People that make a living, and unreported income, will soon have their income reported and be on the grid. From hairdressers, valets to people that sell illegal goods.

More income will HAVE TO BE reported. (as a side note another reason why marijuana should be legalized).

What about the really bad drugs? What happens to that industry when cash is dead? Does it help or hurt that industry? How about unregistered guns that are sold? Or stolen items?


Surveillance cameras watch you, postal service scans your mail, credit card companies track your purchases, cellphone towers can locate you and cookies from surfing let ISPs, websites and domains follow your EVERY move.

Cash is the one last form of privacy consumers have..and soon it will be gone.

The Privacy Wave Is Coming..Get Ready For A VPB Virtual Private Browser

ISPs, domains and even your own device track you while you surf. This EU Proposal is a good start but there are much better ways coming to maintain privacy online.

Combine the cloud (isolate your device) with a "disposable browser", and then you have complete privacy ans security online.

You've hear of a VP, a virtual private network which has 3 major drawbacks (1. cookies, viruses, trackers still are used/exposed to users, 2 a VPN leaves history on your device 3. encryption slows down your surfing.

The solution will be a VPB..a virtual private browser.

EU privacy proposal could dent Facebook, Gmail ad revenue.

 web companies would have to guarantee the confidentiality of their customers' conversations and get their consent before tracking them online to target them with personalized advertisements

email services such as Gmail and Hotmail will not be able to scan customers' emails to serve them with targeted advertisements without getting their explicit agreement

The proposal will also require web browsers to ask users upon installation whether they want to allow websites to place cookies on their browsers to deliver personalized advertisements.

 

Data And Goliath..A Great Read

Bruce Schneier's Data and Goliath is a great read for anyone that is interested on the many ways your behavior (online and offline) is being monitored and being used for and and against you.

The days of "I want off the gird" are coming soon. The ability to have "privacy on a public network" is a very big idea.

Data and Goliath The Hidden Battles to Collect Your Data and Control Your World

Your Online Privacy Is Now In Jeopardy

A big court defeat for the FTC this week is putting the agency's power to protect your online privacy in jeopardy, analysts say. The ruling could wind up giving Google and Facebook, not to mention other companies in the internet ecosystem, the ability to escape all privacy oversight from the FTC, and possibly from the rest of government, too, critics claim, unless Congress intervenes.

Unless regulators can persuade the courts to overturn Monday's decision, the result will be "a fatal blow" to consumer protection, said Jeffrey Chester, executive director of the Center for Digital Democracy.

 "The decision will enable a company like Google … to engage in unfair marketing and data-gathering practices without having to worry about possible FTC consequences," he said.

  (Source)

WhatsApp Sells Out Their User's Privacy

That didn't take long. It can only stay "free" for so long.

Two years later, "Free" service WhatsApp,  will soon begin to share some member information with Facebook. That move that is rankling some of the company’s more than one billion users.

WhatsApp said on Thursday that it would start disclosing the phone numbers and analytics data of its users to Facebook. It will be the first time the messaging service has connected users’ accounts to the social network to share data, as Facebook tries to coordinate information across its collection of businesses.

Remember, when you're not the consumer, you're the product. 

"Do Not Track" Should Be "Do Not Read" Too

President Obama and many others are missing the big picture when it comes to privacy. It's more than tracking you when you surf the Net.

The content sent in email or Facebook messages contains far more personal info than your surfing. Yet nobody seems to have a problem that the info in messages can, and is being used to target ads.

Do Not Track should include Do Not Read as well.

When you use a service like Facebook or Gmail the content on or in their service belongs to them, not you.

Take a look at your emails or Facebook messages and ask yourself if you want an advertiser to be reading them..they already are.

Last week a father attacked Target for sending his teenage daughter baby furniture coupons. Target used the girl's credit card info to determine she was pregnant.

Ovum reported that the cell industry lost billions of dollars in revenue due to social messaging applications.

Here's a double whammy soon to be released. A social messaging app that does not share in ANY way the content in the messages. In fact the content can be erased on command.

Cell providers will still continue to lose revenue from limited SMS and services like Facebook will not be able to sell the data in those messages to advertisers. This is definitely a game changer.

Obama promises privacy legislation.
The Obama administration plans to work with Congress to enact legislation to protect peoples' online privacy based on a Consumer Privacy Bill of Rights being unveiled tomorrow.

At the same time, Google, Yahoo, Microsoft, and AOL are committing to work with Do Not Track technology in most major Web browsers so people can stop companies from tracking them as they bounce around the Internet, the administration said in a statement. 

 Web firms agree to support "Do Not Track"

The new do-not-track button isn't going to stop all Web tracking. The companies have agreed to stop using the data about people's Web browsing habits to customize ads, and have agreed not to use the data for employment, credit, health-care or insurance purposes. But the data can still be used for some purposes such as "market research" and "product development" and can still be obtained by law enforcement officers.

The do-not-track button also wouldn't block companies such as Facebook Inc. from tracking their members through "Like" buttons and other functions

This month is our newsletter, we highlight patented technology,  that eliminates ANY 3rd party from seeing ANY of the content you share with other users over the Net.

Privacy is a wave we highlighted in our book, How To Find Big Stocks. We found (using the tool in the book) several companies with a competitive advantage in this wave.

The tool that turned $10,000 into $2,800,000 in 2 years. HowToFindBigStocks.com

The "Oil" Of the Digital Age

Privacy is one of the investing trends I have said to watch.

In my book (How To Find Big Stocks), I devote an entire chapter to why privacy (and companies that protect it) will offer some exciting investing opportunities.

Every email, text, picture, Facebook (post/comment/picture) that is transmitted when "send" is hit..is stored on a server.

 The average user has 736 pieces of this personal data collected every day, and different service providers retain this information for anywhere between 12 and 60 months.


While that might not make a difference today, it might in the future.


"personal data is the oil of the digital age". 

From NY Times 
Start-Ups Seek to Help Users Put a Price on Their Personal Data

 People have been willing to give away their data while the companies make money. But there is some momentum for the idea that personal data could function as a kind of online currency, to be cashed in directly or exchanged for other items of value.



The tool that turned $10,000 into $2,800,000 in 2 years. HowToFindBigStocks.com

Watch This Trend

Convenience comes with a price. I see a major trend (privacy) coming. The days of "I am off the grid" are getting close.

There will be a service or technology that enables people to surf, communicate without being tracked. I see people PAYING to do these activities knowing they won't be tracked.

People will pay to use email, communicate with friends on a social network and surf knowing their information and Internet activity isn't being recorded.

Interesting story on what tech trends lawyers need to keep an eye on.

I found 2 of particular interest:

Mobile payments and behavioral advertising.

When you start swiping your cell phone to pay for items your sensitive information is being sent over a wireless connection.

Google's recent no opt-out policy eliminates the anonymous Internet. Every click you make will be filled with an ad based on ALL of your information used/stored with Google.

 for Android users, there’s never really an option to be logged out, so everything you do, Google can now track, from searches to direction requests to videos watched

As soon as IPv6 is implemented, every device will have its own IP address, so the days of an anonymous Internet are really over.



See other major investing trends. HowToFindBigStocks.com

Privacy..An Investing Wave To Watch

Privacy is one of the investing trends I suggest keeping an eye on. It is also an investing wave I highlight in my upcoming book.

A recent ruling now means Americans can be forced to decrypt their laptops.

Blackburn, a George W. Bush appointee, ruled that the Fifth Amendment posed no barrier to his decryption order. The Fifth Amendment says that nobody may be "compelled in any criminal case to be a witness against himself," which has become known as the right to avoid self-incrimination.

He said the All Writs Act, which dates back to 1789 and has been used to require telephone companies to aid in surveillance, could be invoked in forcing decryption of hard drives as well. 


A new app for the phone is coming that allows communication over the Net without any trace being left on any server. Privacy on the Net..think of the possibilities.

 
A Big Stock: a company with a competitive advantage (IP, technology, location) in a major investing trend. HowToFindBigStocks.com

Facebook Reveals Your Private Messages

First it's Politico, who is next?  What other website or corporation will pay to see your private messages?


First Facebook "likes" things without your permission now this.

Don't think privacy is a big issue?

 Why Facebook's Data Sharing Matters

Facebook has cut a deal with political website Politico that allows the independent site machine-access to Facebook users' messages, both public and private

Just remember, any content you transmit over the Net is not yours..it is owned by the service provider.


The tool that turned $10,000 into $2,800,000 in 2 years. HowToFindBigStocks.com