ListeningHead.com

Some Privacy Policy

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Here is the privacy policy taken verbatim from the whitehouse.gov site (the highlights are mine):

OUR ONLINE PRIVACY POLICY

We at WhiteHouse.gov are committed to protecting the privacy and security of your visits to this website. Outlined below is our online privacy policy. If you have questions about this policy, please let us know.

Collection and disclosure of information: To ensure we are able to communicate effectively with visitors to our web site, we collect some information that can be directly associated with a specific person. We call this “Personal Information,” and it includes, by way of illustration, names, addresses, telephone numbers and e-mail addresses.

We collect Personal Information from eligible individuals who affirmatively request to receive e-mail or other services from us. We collect this Personal Information in order to provide these eligible individuals with timely information via e-mail regarding events, resources and issues.

It is our general policy not to make Personal Information available to anyone other than our employees, staff, and agents.

Online Comments and Personal Information: We treat your name, city, state, and any comments you provide as public information. We may, for example, provide compilations of your comments to national leaders and other individuals participating in our efforts, without disclosing email addresses. We may also make comments along with your city and state available to the press and public online.

Opting out and modifying information: Subscribers to our e-mail list may terminate their subscriptions via a link at the bottom of each email sent from Whitehouse.gov. [Read more…]

Australian Court Allows Use of Facebook for Debt Collection Purposes

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In my career as a bankruptcy lawyer, I thought I had seen just about everything in the on-going war between consumers and debt collectors.  Today, a new twist – a court in Australia has permitted a mortgage lender to use Facebook as a means to notify a homeowner about pending foreclosure.

On December 12, 2008, the Australian Capital Territory Supreme Court ruled that MKM Capital could use Facebook to serve legal documents on borrowers who had previously been evading other means of service.

So far, reaction to the Australian Court’s decision has not been positive.  Several commentators in Australia note that Facebook is intended to foster social relationships, rather than to serve as a tool for commercial interests to collect debts.

Residents of the United States are not in any danger of receiving a “super poke” from bill collectors anytime soon.  Laws in the United States require bill collectors to respect customers privacy and Facebook itself offers users the option to block undesireable “friends.”  The United State also guarantees its residents due process of law – an email in a Facebook inbox would not withstand a procedure challenge.

However, I think that we can learn from this story that all of us should understand that our privacy is at risk when we document parts of our life online.  Take a look at your Facebook, MySpace, Plaxo or Twitter profile.  How much information could a nefarious third party learn about you simply by studying your various profiles.   How often do your online profiles contain the answers to “secret” profile questions that you answer when you set up your online access to a bank.  You may remember that a hacker broke in to Sarah Palin’s Yahoo account by guessing the answer to her identify confirmation question and changing the password to her account.