OUR LIVES BEHIND THE INTERNET KEYHOLE

It always amuses me to hear people who have no real understanding of the Internet and how it or software works or what kind of information people gather from our use of it. Natasha Singer wrote a great article in the NY Times that explains much more than most of us might realize.  Click here    The title is:  Their APPS track you.  Will Congress track them?

For those of us who have used the Internet to shop for years, if we assume we will never win Megabucks, the odds are similar to our assuming we are safe on the computer.  Assuming of course that you have a fire wall, security software, virus protection, malware protection and scores of other 'protections'.  Naturally, none of these will really protect you from your information being lifted.because what is lifted does not leave traces on your computer.   It only protects you from what is dropped into your computer.  From all we read, that is not true for everyone and identities are lost. I never realized how many people are tracking us.  E-Z Pass tracks our routes;  Every store, restaurant  or shop we frequent tracks us if we use a credit card.  My image of an enormous, underground cave that has everyone's history and demographic profile saved.  I can't make money from my information, but someone who has no connection or permission from me, can sell it for profit to them.

That seems strange but I suppose, if it doesn't cost me anything it may be as harmless as school kids cutting across my yard to get home.  The problem is that I really don't know in what way this impacts me and I am old enough to have read 1984 and it smacks of Big Brother watching me.  I used to think it didn't matter as I am law abiding and have nothing to hide.  I wonder if it is accurate assumption.  I don't mind if people know where I have shopped but I deeply resent being bombarded with ads because I might have shopped for an item as a shower gift of no interest to me.Comcast seems to have finally fixed a pop up ad from England that came up when I started to type in the Google search bar.  I don't use Internet Explorer as my search engine and was told that i could only turn it off if I did use it.  Being dictated as to what I can use reminds me of very early days of computing at home.  A techy would set up your config file to run their program which worked fine while you had him on line (They were always 'local hims' in those days.)   Before hang up the telephone you checked and the program you just installed was working fine.  However, when you hung up and tried to open anything else, it usually did not work.  Problems are easier to solve today when you can see them.  It is what you can't see that is frustrating.  It is like having invisible people living in your house, using your things and moving them around,