Google's CEO Eric Schmidt has admitted that his thinks that internet anonymity won't last, with governments looking to maintain visibility over users' online movements.
Speaking at the Techonomy conference in the US, Schmidt said that, in the interests of stopping criminal or anti-social behaviour, governments will demand a more active role:
"The only way to manage this is true transparency and no anonymity. In a world of asynchronous threats, it is too dangerous for there not to be some way to identify you. We need a [verified] name service for people. Governments will demand it."
Seismic change
He also added that the amount of content users are putting online means people need to be ready for a seismic change in the way their data is used, according to ReadWriteWeb:
"If I look at enough of your messaging and your location, and use artificial intelligence we can predict where you are going to go," said Schmidt.
"Show us 14 photos of yourself and we can identify who you are. You think you don't have 14 photos of yourself on the internet? You've got Facebook photos!
"People will find it's very useful to have devices that remember what you want to do, because you forgot... But society isn't ready for questions that will be raised as result of user-generated content."
Benefits
However, he pointed out that despite the obvious privacy issues users will have to deal with; the sheer volume of information being published online will have fantastic benefits to the lives of nearly everyone:
"In our lifetimes we'll go from a small number of people having access to information, to 5 billion people having all the world's knowledge in their native language."
From ReadWriteWeb via SlashDot
Your comments (3) Click to add a new comment
lovlid
August 6th 2010
3. Terrorism is the excuse they love to use when they want to invade your privacy. And I don't need anyone telling me what I might need. I especially don't need bombarding with recommendations for, lets say, Lonnie Donegan CDs, because I bought one for my Dads birthday. Its called spamming, and its illegal.
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ibanezlewis
August 6th 2010
2. Personally I think this is a good thing. I'd feel safer knowing that the government keeps tabs on individuals who are likely to be terrorists etc. Also, technology that is tailored to the individual is good. If it tracks our habits and recommends things we like then I'm all for it. Not everybody needs one of these devices so it's not like you don't have a choice in the matter either.
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lovlid
August 6th 2010
1. Googlespy want to know who you are.
Googlespy want to know where you've been.
Googlespy want to be able to predict where your going next.
Googlespy will help any government that helps them do all these things.
Googlespy want your money.
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