High-tech companies that pioneer, develop and mine the Internet threaten the right to privacy and remove individual control of personal information. Yet, as the industry causes these concerns, it is also providing solutions. And this primarily has been happening without government regulation.
Take, for example, the host of new tools that address the privacy concerns of both individuals and enterprises. Such products and services aim to protect privacy by proxying personal information, e-mail addresses and shopping patterns through secure servers. For instance, iPrivacy lets individuals surf, and order, pay for and receive products without revealing private information to third parties on the Internet. IPrivacy offers its technology to enterprises and its services to individuals. American Express offers account holders shopping online a unique, secure "private payments" number that protects account information.
Enterprises looking for end-to-end solutions can try suites of services provided by managed security service providers. SSPs take a comprehensive approach to network security and safeguard data, media and infrastructure. Exodus and other SSPs provide enterprises with ongoing threat assessments to identify and provide secure access to corporate assets. They also engage ongoing vulnerability assessments, provide state-of-the-art encryption to safeguard data, and provide and manage network access-control products, such as firewalls and VPNs.
Encryption methods can secure e-mail by scrambling and encoding messages so that only the intended recipient can unscramble and read them. Further, encrypted message stores can prevent others from reading stored mail. Providers such as Hush Communications let individuals and corporate subscribers secure e-mail and other communications using a key-pair management technology based on 1,024-bit data encryption. Also, many commercial e-mail servers, such as Stalker's CommuniGate Pro, provide options for SSL connections and encryption services. A service from Disappearing Inc. aims to remove mail from prying eyes using a time-sensitive encryption technique. Subscribers can include a time-to-live factor with sent mail. Readers can unencrypt the mail using the encryption service within the time-to-live factor.
LRN, a legal knowledge company, recognizes that e-mail is fast, easy and efficient, but can leave behind a durable, persistent and damaging business record. As such, LRN offers online tutorials through its Legal Compliance Educational Center to help users understand legal concepts and identify legal issues on topics that include antitrust, copyright and e-mail.
The World Wide Web Consortium has developed a standard, automated technique for individuals to control their use of personal information and for enterprises to communicate their privacy policies. The Platform for Privacy Preferences Project (P3P) will let machines negotiate how much information an individual is willing to give up in light of a Web site's privacy policy. P3P-enabled Web sites make their privacy information available in a machine-readable format for browsers. Browsers read this information and compare it with the privacy preferences set by the end user. Personal information is available only to sites that satisfy the privacy preferences set in the browser.
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