Online Privacy - Is My Information Safe?

I think most people would be shocked at how little online privacy people have. When you realise that every single web site you visit, every email you send and every forum you hang out on is logged and recorded for years it can make you feel quite uncomfortable.

Sure you can log on to your favourite web site or online forum and search for their privacy policy. You'll find lots of legal talk mainly designed to cover their backs as they record and monitor your favourite web pages, upload cookies to your machine and target your email with carefully selected special offers. The new wave of internet browsers are helping, feature like Chromes Incognito mode are blocking cookies and popups and stopping personal information being logged on your machine but that was always the easiest privacy problem to solve.

The most difficult part on protecting your online privacy is a simple little language or protocol called HTTP. You see HTTP is how your web browser communicates with the web sites you visit. It's very simple, very efficient and very fast but unfortunately it is also in completely clear text and is visible by everyone. I always like to think of it as shouting across a crowded room, not everyone can hear because they are not listening to you but everything you shout is instantly available to everyone in the room if they care to listen.

Thanks to the Hyper Text Transport Protocol, practically everything we do online has no privacy as it is is in clear text. Absolutely everything we do online is stored at our ISP, any personal information we send is logged here, and in many other places on it's clear text HTTP journey. Of course our service providers are not interested in all this information - there's simply too much of it and it is expensive to store.

This is the reason that the ISPs are being directed by various bills and laws in countries across the world to keep this information. The usual excuse for invading peoples privacy and accessing their personal information is to catch baddies and track terrorists online. This is of course a perfectly good argument but I do wonder is the slim chance of catching the odd online crook worth sacrificing everyone's online privacy.

I use the very best privacy software on the market and you to can surf securely too. It's fast, completely encrypted and gives you access to a huge network of private proxies. You can even use it to watch the BBC Iplayer abroad on a UK proxy. Take care and stay safe
Jim

Article Source: ArticlesBase.com