Computer Privacy Annoyances
By Dan Tynan
First Edition July 2005
Series: Annoyances
ISBN: 0-596-00775-2
190 pages, $19.95 US, $27.95 CA, £12.95 UK
Short Review
Smiley Rating: Excellent. :) :) :) :) :) of 5
Are you concerned with spam and the threat of identity theft? The author provides useful information and advice on these and many other privacy matters.
The book does an excellent job of presenting things we probably all should know about computer privacy in a down to earth and personal way. The book is short and an easy read.
The heart of the book is more than 125 annoyances related to the subject; for each annoyance, there is a fix. The author supplements the text with engaging graphics and lists.
For more detail, see my Somewhat Longer Review.
George Woolley of Oakland.pm and Camelot.pm
Miscellaneous
Chapter Titles
- Chapter 1. Privacy at Risk
- Chapter 2. Privacy at Home
- Chapter 3. Privacy on the Net
- Chapter 4. Privacy at Work
- Chapter 5. Privacy in Public
- Chapter 6. Privacy and Uncle Sam
- Chapter 7. Privacy in the Future
Notes:
- To view the full table of contents, visit the O'Reilly catalog entry for it.
Online Watch
The book "Computer Privacy Annoyances" is on Safari. :) In fact, that's where I read the book.
Here's a few of the many links in the book
- American Civil Liberties Union
- Donotcall.com
- Electronic Privacy Information Center
- Ordering Pizza in 2010
- Privacy Rights Clearinghouse
By the Numbers
Here's a small sample of the Privacy by the Numbers factoids the book provides.
- US victims of identity theft from 1998 to 2003: 27.3 million.
- Money lost by ID theft victims in that period: $5 billion.
- Average time for an unprotected PC to suffer a hack attack on the Net: 12 minutes.
- Spam emails blocked by AOL in a randomly selected 12-hour period in July 2004: 428 million.
- Firms that have fired employees for violating written email policies: 1 in 4.
Notes:
- The factoids above are in the book's wording at least to the colon.
Some Provocative Quotes
Here's a few provocative quotes from the book.
- "In Europe, Canada, and much of Asia, a data collector can't share your information without your explicit permission."
- "4 out of 5 credit reports contain errors"
- "police may attach a GPS device to a car without a warrant."
- "You have zero privacy. Get over it." -- Scott McNeely (The author thinks the situation is less grim than this and that there are things you can do that make sense.)
Note:
- In the one case where the quote is attributed to someone else, the attribution follows the quote.
Some Terms and Acronyms
Here's a few of the terms and acronyms that come up in the book
- HIPPA
- identity theft
- phishing
- RFID
- SPAM
- trojan horses
- WiFi
- zombies
Somewhat Longer Review
Contents
Note:
- Published by O'Reilly.
The Title
Computer Privacy: I expected the book to address such annoyances as
- spam
- email scams
- identity theft
Annoyances: O'Reilly has an Annoyances series of books. What I expected was that a large number of computer privacy annoyances would be addressed in an Annoyance/Solution format.
Does the Title Fit the Book?: Yes.
The book addresses each of the annoyances mentioned above and many more. And it wisely addresses problems as they exist rather than artificially dividing problems into computer parts and non-computer parts. The book presents a large number of annoyances in the form Annoyance/Fix.
The Reviewer
Books: I haven't read any other books in the O'Reilly Annoyances Series, though I am certainly familiar with the basic concept.
The only other book I've read on computer privacy is "Spam Letters", and actually that's humor (though I did learn a little).
Do Have: Some of the things that I have that are relevant here are
- a cordless phone and a regular phone
- an ISP
- an email account
- several browsers
- a domain
- a firewall
Don't Have: Some of the things I don't have are
- an AOL account
- kids (though I do have two grown children)
- a job (I'm retired, at least for now)
- a habit of doing music downloads
Expertise: Although I made my living for years as a software developer, I'm a novice at computer privacy.
OS: I primarily use Linux. Linux is much less vulnerable to viruses than Windows. However, I still get lots of spam, have had attempts to steal my identity (I think), etc.
When OS is important, as in examples, the book focuses on Windows with some attention to Macs. However, most of the book is not OS specific, and where the book is OS specific, the basic idea is clear enough that I'd be able to fill in the blanks.
Personal Experience and Interest: I certainly have some personal experience with such things as
- spam
- junk snail-mail
- attempted scams (so far they haven't got me so far as I know)
Work: Well I don't have a job so some material in the book is not directly relevant to me. However, most of the people I know do have a job.
What Get
What you get is
- a chapter which communicates why you should care about privacy
- 5 chapters of annoyances
- a chapter about the future.
For the names of the 5 chapters explicitly containing annoyances, see Chapter Titles in the left column; it's all the chapters except the first and last. If you want to see the full table of contents, you can get to it via the catalog entry for the book.
There are more than 125 annoyances in the form Annoyance/Fix. There are some well chosen graphics for variety. There's also a number of Privacy By the Numbers lists that are quite interesting.
Likes
Balance: The author approaches the issues involved with a balanced perspective. Privacy comes with tradeoffs and the author points this out a number of times.
Format: I like the Annoyance/Fix format that much of the book is in. I also like the way the author includes graphics and Privacy By the Numbers lists in addition to the text.
Information: There's an incredible amount of useful information in this book.
Inspiration: The book has been an inspiration for me to take a number of steps to improve my privacy situation.
Gripes
missing address: In the Annoyance on "Junking Junk Mail", there's a sentence which purports to give the snail mail address of the Direct Marketing Association's Mail Preference Service, but the sentence ends in a colon and does not include the address. However a URL is given.
Windows-centric: Where it's appropriate to deal with a specific OS, the author most often focuses on Windows. It appears to me that Windows is way less secure than either Mac OS X or Linux.
I wonder if one way for Windows users to improve privacy wouldn't be to change their OS. I wish the author explored this possibility in the book.
Who for?
For: The book says it's for everyone. Mostly I agree.
Not For: I don't recommend the book for
- someone who is an expert in computer privacy and is broadly aware of the field.
- someone who has no room at all for problems
- someone who owns nothing, has no credit, and just doesn't care.
Now that I think of it, maybe that expert could find some value in the book. For example, if the expert wants to communicate some of his knowledge.
Final Thoughts
This is a short easy-to-read book chock full of information that should interest just about everyone. I recommend it to anyone who is not an expert on computer privacy. If you own anything or have any semblance of a good credit, I suggest reading this book.