It turns out that the company sporting the motto "don't be evil" has been asking parents nationwide to disclose their children's personal information, including Social Security Numbers, and recruiting schools to help them do it, all by entering an art contest.
The Contest is called "Doodle-4-Google". The company is even offering prize money to schools to enlist their help. Google even “OK’s” and “partners with” the following after school activities per their FAQ (I wonder how much who paid whom?):
“The Contest is also open to students who participate in one of the following “After School Programs” and are also enrolled in a U.S. School as defined above: (i) Boys & Girls Clubs of America; or (ii) Girl Scouts of the USA.” They avoided the Boy Scouts, though.
It sound like fun? Don't you want your kid to enter too?
OK! Who’s Eligible?
“4. Eligibility. The Contest is open to students enrolled in private or public elementary and secondary schools (grades K– 12) as well as home schools (grades K-12) in the 50 United States and the District of Columbia, excluding U.S. territories (collectively, “U.S. School(s)”). The Contest is also open to students who participate in one of the following “After School Programs” and are also enrolled in a U.S. School as defined above: (i) Boys & Girls Clubs of America; or (ii) Girl Scouts of the USA. Registration opens January 19, 2011. Registration ends March 2, 2011 at 11:59:59 P.M. Pacific Time (PT). Only one doodle per Entrant is allowed. In the case of duplicate or multiple entries from the same Entrant, then the first entry to arrive at the designated submission address (as determined by the “received by” date) will be accepted as the entry into the Contest. Internet access is required to register for the Contest. At the time of submission of a Doodle, each Entrant must: (i) be a U.S. citizen or a permanent U.S. legal resident (e.g., must be able to show proof of legal permanent residence, for example, a “green card”); (ii) be enrolled in a U.S. School (defined above); (iii) have obtained his or her parents’ or legal guardians’ prior permission and have agreed to be bound by these Rules on the Parent Consent Form.”
The reason Google gives for doing this competition in their FAQ says it's because "We love to encourage and celebrate the creativity of young people..." etc. isn’t that nice?
W a i t a minute:
A huge database of names and addresses of American children, especially one that includes their dates of birth and SSNs, would be worth many millions to marketing firms and retailers, wouldn’t it?
You see, what Google knows (and many parents don't know) is that a person's city of birth and year of birth can be used to make a statistical guess about the first five digits of his/her social security number.
“Part of the security problem lies with the method used to assign SSNs. The researchers note that only four digits of the nine digit SSN are random. The first three digits are called the Area Number (AN) and the next two are the Group Number (GN). ANs are allocated to specific states and GNs to specific birth years. Given the date of birth and place of birth, researchers need only guess at the final four digits.” - Alessandro Acquisti and Ralph Gross Carnegie Mellon University.
So…. with the form you see above, you’ve just given Google your child’s Social Security Number. They don’t even have to guess. And you were worried about computer security?
So: If you can obtain those last four SSN digits explicitly, you've unlocked countless troves of personal information from someone who didn't even understand that such a disclosure was happening. This kind of data can be linked with other databases to target advertising, but Google wouldn’t do that, surely? Faster than a long tailed tom cat in a room full of rockers, I say.
It's worth many times more than what Google will spend on prizes (each State Finalist gets a T-shirt! The winner gets a Wacom tablet! Wow!). Maybe the TShirt should look like this?
To be strictly fair, Google hasn’t disclosed any such plan, nor has evidence surfaced exposing one. The entry form is one half page followed by five pages of legal mumbo-jumbo in (you guessed it) small print.
Google could have plans to just throw the data away, right? Maybe “the last 4” was inadvertently added to the competition form? There are all sorts of innocent and inconceivable explanations for this, aren’t there? So why (from their FAQ) is “Doodle 4 Google is still designed to work with schools across the nation (public, private and home schools).” Why not schools outside the USA? Maybe because those kids have no “last four”?
So, one question keeps haunting me: “Why the hell does Google need the “last four”?”
Additional links:
http://itmanagement.earthweb.com/secu/article.php/3828716/Social-Security-Numbers-Easy-to-Hack.htm
http://www.google.com/doodle4google/faqs.html
Bipolar runs in families--only one of us has health insurance (I'm joking...maybe).
Po, have you tried watching suspense movies from the 1970s? The majority of them would not work in the present, because the premise for the suspense could always be alleviated at the present with a call on the cell! (ring-ring - "Hey, remember that guy you're going to see that you think is your new friend. Well, I just discovered he's really a psycho killer, so DON'T SEE HIM!")
Like all modern conveniences (including the internet, Google, the automobile, supermarkets, etc.) our life is made both easier and harder by integrating the "new" into our lives. YOU don't think you "need" a cell phone because you remember a time when we didn't have them. My parents don't understand why I'm so dependent on broad band (or the internet for that matter -- they live in the sticks -- they have dial up -- they use their computer for playing solitaire). My deceased grandparents didn't understand why we all needed a car! They walked, used a bicycle or rode a horse to the market.
Once again, I'm going to say it -- I understand Ted Kaczynski. I know the future is going to throw all kinds of new fangled things my way that they've invented a "need" for me to have; if I resist, I will pay and if I give in, I will pay. I'm just glad I'm too old to be important anymore, and will probably be dead before it all gets too much for me.
do both not do so for the same reason? to make a living. Show me a person who goes to med school out of nothing but unselfish intentions and i'll show you his brand new BMW...
not to mention you being a doctor should full well know the implications of food borne illness. Both take matters of life and death into their hands.
I don't really think we'll find an agreement here but figured i would lay out my first thoughts to your reply.
Bottom line, is that some people are jerks.
You...ALL of us are stronger than that. I used to think the same way. Then my apartment was robbed. I went 6 months with no TV or internet. I ended up reading books, I wrote some of my best songs, did 'My Fat Friend' and 'Death Trap' with my community theater and squeezed in a production of 'Bathroom Humor' for a dinner theater that I actually got payed for AND did not miss what I was 'missing'. Then it all was recovered. That quick I was back to watching reruns of Next Generation every night while I surfed the web at the same time. (BTW - I didn't even have a cell phone at the time) When I was asked to do another Dinner Theater gig, I said I was to busy and read my first two books since then just this past year.
Thanks, Phoon.
I'd suggest only that you look at the definitions of 'respect' and of 'courtes'. They aren't equivalent.
As for the remainder of what you wrote? A fragile, narcissistic personality will act the same in any situation. It's not profession specific. It just appears worse in that setting because of personal need, and tv shows characterizing such personalities. They (tv shows/novels/plays) tend to idealize/generalize and people watching them 'learn' those inexact ways of thinking... then go back to real life and label and 'fit' their own doctor/etc. in one category or another.
It's all too human...
You wouldn't tolerate a rude waitress or waiter or a salesman who kept referring to his female co-workers as 'dem bitches' so why tolerate a doctor, the person you entrust with your very health when they don't give you the respect you want. Notice I didn't say the 'respect you deserve' because that's really what it's all about. You get what you give. That's my point. Most people who are so rude as to allow the 'cell phone' to take priority over everything, let alone something that may be as important or as urgent as their physical well being are often the first to 'dis' the caretaker when he or she responds with the same level of courtesy or respect. Hell, I've walked in and demanded all my damn files from one doctor for this kind of crap. Long story short, he almost turned me into a quadriplegic. I had no problem telling him what I thought of him..in front of a full waiting room...and demanding every scrap of paper he had on me.
The primary motive for most MD's is not money. It is to help others. I have never owned an extravagant car. As for the food borne illness? Let's not be absurd. If I were to go to that length, I'd suggest you then get your medical treatment at BurgerKing and your lunch at the doctor's office. Washing one's hands after using the toilet is not, has never and will never be the same as going to medical school, interning, specializing and treating human suffering.
I agree we'll probably never agree on this topic.
I'll buy that.
Bravo!
succinctly my point.
Yes, but people are willingly giving that information knowing full well what it is needed for. And, when you're asked for your SSN for job, credit card, bank account etc. there is usually a privacy act statement attached somewhere in those documents telling you that you don't have to give your SSN but it helps in the process. Google didn't do that and they didn't say what it was for initially. And, since they don't adhere to the privacy act, they can use it however they want.
I'm sorry, Noah -- I'm NOT that strong. I "existed" through the 2004 hurricane season in Central Florida. We lost our power for 2 weeks with hurricane Charley and 6 weeks with hurricane Frances. You have to remember if I can't get on the web, I can't work, and I'm the only one in my household with a full-time job, so there was no income coming in at my house. The first few days were okay -- we made up ghost stories around the grill while we cooked what was in the fridge because it was going to go bad soon; we read, donated blood...eventually the road was drivable enough to go to a nearby city to the movie theater to cool down a little, but by the end of the first 2 weeks, I was ready to not only divorce my husband but knife him for breathing the wrong way and whining about not having a generator. Right now I can't think of what possessed me to feel those things, (we celebrated our 10th anniversary at the end of December, had a fancy vow renewal to rival any fancy wedding I've ever been to, and I can't imagine wanting to live without him...but at that time, in the heat, humidity, broken house, no income...I wanted to kill somebody, and he happened to be convenient).
bleh w.e we've veered far enough off topic
I do find it amusing that something that kills thousands of people every year.. that can be easily prevented is absurd to a doctor though.
But more to my point.. we place our lives in the hands of many people through out the day in our modern society. Doctors are not the only ones, the taxi driver, the person who cooks our food.. the woman talking on her cell phone in the lane next to you. Yet somehow you seem to think doctors are deserving of some greater reverence.. isn't their place in the upper tax brackets enough? money isn't good enough anymore?
I would have said "deserve" or "are entitled to as another human being". "Want" isn't rational or logical.
One thing you do have to accept: The doctor-patient relationship is not an 'equal' one, any more than a lawyer-client one is. It is inherently unequal. One has knowledge, the other, need. One comes to the other, unless one is too sick, and then the other visits in hospital. It is a relationship governed by ethics, rules, expectations and hope. Pretty complex, but not an equal relationship: Except on the human level. There is where the equality and frustration are usually found. On that level we are all one. Not only the patient is frustrated. The doctor very frequently is frustrated as well. Therefore, forbearance, patience and understanding are needed on both sides.
Thanks for bringing it back to OT, natas2. What you have written is correct, but unfortunately while one is always free to decline giving the SS number, the prospective employer may exempt the applicant from consideration for the job and not be held liable for that. Theoretically (and confirmed in a court decision) the IRS cannot ask for your SS number.
People cross privacy boundaries all the time, and rarely are called on it. I think this should be a matter of Federal law, and that citizens be apprised of it and all segments of society forced to comply with it. Only then will privacy have any meaning at all.
Nite, all. Off to bed. Thanks for the stimulating discussion.
This just struck me as sort of funny:
Next post...
Me too!
Hey, neither was a doctor, my cell phone was holstered, they never told me WHY I had to scan my license, and chocolate syrup dribbled over a scoop of vanilla ice cream does not chocolate ice cream make. Pimple-face could have jumped in any time and got a few zingers in...if my wife hadn't been dragging me out the door at the time.
Yeah, I wondered why the subject went on and on about cell phones... didn't seem relevant.
Then it occurred to me, Google makes a cell phone OS... now that's relevant!
Why does Google want an OS on mobile Phones?
And is that cell phone OS like Google's PC Toolbars that phone home with users history and usage data?
I mean, we're all agreed that Google is in the business of data collection, right?
So, then, why wouldn't Google use its cell phone OS to divulge users information?
..................................................................................................................
Personally, I'd never own a mobile/cell phone.... and most certainly/definitely not one with Google's Android OS on it... ever.
Don't need one as I have a landline phone within reach 99% of the time, and even then none of the additional features are activated.
I refuse to activate call waiting. incoming call, message bank or answering services.... they cost extra and are not that convenient.
If I don't answer my phone I'm either out or on another call, meaning who ever wants me can call later and it costs neither of us extra.
I think cell phones are great. Bluetooth to. For my work it was invaluable. Never missed a call. Not to mention emergencies. Stalled car,
mugging, don't forget to pick up the cat at the vets..... Not a google phone, first I hear of it. Frak!
Google's cell phone OS is called Android.
Thanks On my not list.
Doctors do not have 'customers'. They have 'patients' or 'clients'.
Architects do not have 'customers' either. They have 'clients'.
Lawyers do not have 'customers' as well. Ignoring 'plaintiff' and/or 'defendant', theirs would be 'clients'.
Professional careers are not equivalent to some 'burger-flipper' at a fastfood outlet.
It's not ego-tripping, it's just a distinction between Commerce and Professional Practise.....
starkers.... re not having a cell/mobile.... I've had one since they were no longer 'brick sized' .... and on at least one occasion averted a multiple on the Tulla freeway when boxes were strewn accross 4 lanes of highway on a blind bend.
We didn't manage to stop a taxi hitting one...but he survived.... or the B-Double who almost fully jack-knifed .... but we cleared the boxes whilst alerting triple 'O'.
The police were most appreciative. Only Terry was pissed that I hadn't scored one of the Imported Italian leather handbags that were in the boxes....
No-one was hurt, but the outcome could have been guaranteed to have been different without immediate communication...
Ah, but that's where the need does not arise for me. One, I am no longer able to drive and would imagine my sister, son, daughter or taxi driver would have a mobile should such an occasion ever arise while I am a passenger. And for the places I am able to walk to from home, there are several public phones available so I'm always within reasonable distance of phone communication should it become necessary.
Not only that, mrs starkers does have a pre-paid with Optus for the direst of circumstances.... 000 and the like, but I've never as much as picked it up to turn it on, much less ever use it for anything. Simply put, I just don't like them... too fiddly and small for my liking...and too many damned buttons/functions on the bastards these days. I just want a simple, uncomplicated device that takes and makes calls and nothing more. Anything else is superfluous.
Simply put, I will not pay for the privilege of not using the bells and whistles that come with the confounded contraptions, will I! As it is the new fangled home phone we have has more blasted buttons and functions than I need or will ever use.... damned call waiting, conferencing, message bank and blah, blah, blah. If the button doesn't have 1 to 0 on it, or doesn't hang up/open a line, I just don't use it.
Yes, I like to keep up with the times when it comes to PC's, but I'm pretty old fashioned about a lot of stuff... phones being just one old school item of several.
Here you go starkers (although it does have an address book , which if you read the description, you'll get the smiley):
http://www.johnsphones.com/
http://www.intomobile.com/2010/12/14/johns-phone-review/
Thanks, natas, but it's still a bloody cell phone. It's too small for a start... I like something that reaches your mouth and can be spoken directly into [without having to do Lip Olympics on a windy day] while placed beside the ear.
Besides, I can't get somebody else at the pub to answer it and say: "He's not here?"
Not like I can when there's no cell and the missus HAS to ring the pub direct.
Nah, it has more to do with not being important enough to be reachable by phone 24/7/365. There are times when I just want peace and solitude away from the madding crowd. Sure, I could turn it off to achieve that.... but then there'd be no point of having one.
Look, even the lure of having a ring tone off/vibrating phone in my pants pocket isn't enough for me to own one.
my Sony cell phone is so old that the battery needs to recharged every other day. I'd like to get a smart phone just because they're pretty neat but I object to having to pay for their data package fees for internet service that I probably will not use.
SS's, it is required by law that employers verify the residency of their applicants (social security administration). it is required by law that banks tie in the customer accounts to social security numbers or whatever the other IRS identifiers have for businesses (IRS tax laws). hopefully, you don't have to give these daily but once in a blue moon.
you do not have to give your telephone number to transact any business activity except when using a check at check out, just say no, it's a marketing tool anyhow.
I've been asked for my birthdate when purchasing smokes, only at RiteAid. the first and only time this happened I told him 1/1/11. I got a disbelieving look from the clerk and almost launched into explaining the difference between me, at 60+ years and someone who might be 18. I don't go to RiteAid anymore.
If someone asks for your telephone or SS number or other personal data ask them what they need it for and if not providing the information will affect the current transaction. It's your choice whether or not to provide them with it but generally a simple "NO" usually suffices.
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