Does the flood of information ever end?  Do we have to know everything about everyone—in real time?  While location-tracking software is not new (well, not too new, anyway), Google’s expected move into this market only further reinforces Scott McNealy’s eerily prophetic saying, “You have zero privacy anyway.  Get over it.”  But now when you “get over it,” all of your friends will be able to see exactly where you were and when.

Google just launched its Latitude software that lets mobile phone users share their mapped location with their network of contacts—if they so choose.  This is nothing new, per se, given the existence of other companies such as Loopt, BrightKite, and Dopplr (for example), as well as most people’s familiarity with GPS, but Google’s entry into the marketplace provides further evidence that the technology is becoming even more widespread.  Maybe too much so.  But when the 800 pound gorilla talks, everyone listens.

According to the article, Google “hopes it will help people find each other while out and about and keep track of loved ones.”  Those are helpful and noble intentions.  What parents wouldn’t want to know where their teenagers are?  Or be able to direct a lost friend to your precise location?  But hope is a fickle thing.  And what Google hopes for and how Latitude will actually be used are two entirely different things.  We all know what the road to hell is paved with.  Lawyers make their living off of it (more on that in a moment).

Google requires that people expressly sign-up for the service and gives them the opportunity to tailor their preferences as to who they can share their location with, as well as the type of information shared.  While that gives the user some degree of control, it’s probably only a matter of time before a bored 16 year-old in hacks into the system and tracks people. 

Even if this doesn’t occur anytime soon, a disgruntled ex-husband may be able to track his ex-wife who forgot to take him out of her “network.”  While entire companies have sprung-up offering this type of GPS-based (and typically illegal) service, now a person can do so without any special equipment whatsoever.  Just a little bit of software and a forgetful spouse.  It goes without saying that stalking is a very real problem in this digital age and tools that used to be available only to law enforcement are becoming increasingly more common.

The fact that such software is even available is part of the larger privacy debate that will be with us for quite some time.  There are no easy answers in a society that never seems to have enough information about others.  Yet from a litigation perspective, few people may realize that all of this location data is stored by a provider for varying degrees of time and subject to subpoena and disclosure in the proper circumstances. 

Thus, in criminal or civil cases where a person’s time and location is an issue, it provides yet one more tool for lawyers to pursue when representing their clients.  Just ask those divorce attorneys in Massachusetts and elsewhere about getting all of that “E-Z Pass” toll information to discover cheating spouses.  Modern convenience has its costs.

So the age old Perry Mason question, “Where were you on February 4, 2009?” now becomes, “Why were you on the corner of 53rd and 7th Avenue at 3:12 p.m. on February 4, 2009?”  And while it may—may—help lawyers such as myself get to the truth faster in a courtroom, the human part of me (and yes, that still exists) finds it it to be unsettling.  So bad grammar aside, the question, ”Where you at?” now becomes, “Why you there?”  Ah technology . . . .

It may be due to a difficult job market.  Or perhaps it’s just a sign of the times.  According to one article, however, 83% of recruiters now search the internet for “digital dirt” in order to weed out prospective job candidates.  Thus, inappropriate Facebook photos, unbecoming MySpace profiles, vituperative message board postings, controversial political statements, publicly available criminal records, or any other questionable information are helping recruiters eliminate otherwise promising candidates from available positions.   

But it’s not just recruiters who are doing this.  More and more companies—both large and small—are either doing their own in-house searches or subcontracting them out to investigators who do them quickly and inexpensively.  Employers are all too aware that the costliest and most expensive decisions they make have to do with hiring the “right” people.  And the flood of information out there helps them in their decision-making process. 

And it’s perfectly legal.  If you voluntarily provide information and pictures for others to see, you can’t complain if it doesn’t always garner the results you want.  Of course, if a potential employer hacks into a system or uses a password without authorization to compile its profile on you, then you may have legal recourse (assuming that you ever find out about it).  You won’t have the job, but you’ll have the chance to bring an expensive and time-consuming lawsuit. 

So, as I mentioned in my last posting, be careful in general, but especially if you’re unemployed and looking for work (or will be facing that prospect shortly).  If you have any doubts about posting something, this in itself should tell you that perhaps it’s better to resist the urge.  Remember:  When in doubt, keep it out! 

According to a new survey by Forrester Research, 41% of large companies (those having at least 20,000 employees) either read or analyze the contents of outbound e-mail.  They’re either paying other employees to read them or presumably using any number of commercially available software programs to analyze them. 

44% of the companies surveyed investigated a confidential data breach involving e-mail in the past year, while 26% said they fired an employee for violating the company’s e-mail policy.  Companies also expressed concern over employees leaking information on message boards, blogs, and other electronic media.

Quite frankly, I’m surprised only 41% of large companies are doing this (although it depends on the industry).  I would have expected it to have been much higher given the daily parade of data and privacy breaches in the news.  After all, it’s large companies that have the financial and human resources to implement widescale e-mail monitoring systems.  Smaller companies may be in a much different situation.

Of course, many employers find it distasteful to engage in this type of monitoring.  It can, if not handled properly, be destructive to employee morale and have lasting effects.  Nevertheless—for better or worse—many employees are slowly coming to grips with their employers’ monitoring efforts.  It’s just becoming a fact of life. 

But the truth is, I’ve had clients whose employees have e-mailed confidential and sensitive company data.  Some workers do it without thinking about it, while others are far more malevolent in their intentions.  This is especially the case when employees leave their companies on bad or poor terms.  So it’s a very real problem for employers that has very real consequences.  Thus, like it or not, monitoring will only continue to increase. 

Bottom Line:  Be careful.  You don’t have any right to privacy when you’re at work.  So don’t think that anything you send—whether to a spouse, boyfriend, girlfriend, doctor, stockbroker, or anyone else—is private.  Even if you have to send it and it can’t wait until you get home, an employer is within its rights to read your e-mail, no matter how private the subject matter.  Of course, what it does with that information is another matter.

In today’s world, where fraud is just a mouse click away, it’s nice to know that every so often the good guys win.  Three international hackers were indicted by the Department of Justice (”DOJ”) last week for trying to steal and sell credit card information from customers of Dave & Buster’s, the popular restaurant/entertainment chain.

According to the indictment, the hackers were able to install “packet sniffers” on many of the company’s servers to copy credit card information as it traveled between restaurants and Dave & Buster’s corporate headquarters in Dallas.  The company detected the intrusion and alerted the authorities, but not before 5,000 credit/debit card numbers were stolen and sold to other criminals to make fraudulent purchases.

One of the foreign hackers was arrested in Miami.  No problem there.  The other two, however, were arrested in the Ukraine and in Germany by those countries’ authorities.  It’s certainly not a done deal yet.  The DOJ is seeking the extradition of the other two, but no word yet whether those efforts will be successful. 

While these sorts of arrests are still few and far between given the magnitude of data theft and online fraud, it’s a start.  The DOJ is obviously taking the problem seriously.  Hopefully, other countries will too and the cooperation will continue.  With any luck, if these hackers are extradited, tried, and found guilty, the court will make an example out of them.