Google’s watching you
The internet allows instant access to information about any person. Your career. Your personal life. Your ranking in the sixth grade spelling bee. It’s all out there, and somebody who is particularly privacy-minded could find it rather disconcerting. Well, if you opt into Google’s new Google Latitude, web users will be able to track you even more closely - your location at any given time will be tracked via the internet.
Marketed as “a fun way to feel close to the people you care about,” Google Latitude is a feature in Google Maps that allows users on computers or smartphones to view the location of fellow users on the map - they can then communicate with the person they’re viewing by text, chat, or Gmail. According to ChannelWeb’s article, this is an opt-in feature - you can only be tracked if you agree to be tracked. Proponents of Google Latitude cite scenarios in which the technology could come in handy. For example, parents of teens could keep tabs on their children’s actual locations - “I’m studying at the library” won’t fly when Google Latitude finds your teen at a different location (although the ability to manually enter a location could potentially foil the intentions of protective parents).
However, many have come to question the consequences of location mapping. ChannelWeb takes a look at the application of this technology in the workplace, and the potential legal pitfalls for employers who use it to track employees. JR Raphael of PC World goes one further, citing precedents where information that had once been private later became public - and compromising Google’s assurance that only your friends and family will see your data. As a woman living in the city, I’ve had enough of that “somebody’s following me” feeling without the high-tech guarantee that someone is, in fact, following me. Think I’ll pass on this one.
