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Privacy: And How to Get It Back
In this forceful short book, technology guru and author of the best-selling Social Media is Bull (St. Martins Press) B.J. Mendelson exposes the crude reality behind the smiley face of internet networking: data trading. We are all auctioning our personal information, the book argues, to the highest bidder. Mendelson discusses the end of privacy from a contemporary perspective, including chapters on:
Metadata and its uses
Data auctions
The Internet of Things
The use of social media for surveillance and suppression
Just how safe is Cloud technology
The Big Business of Big Data
How online retailers stalk, without permission, their customers
Anonymous and web activism
The internet's dark side: Silk Road, hacking, extortion
EFF and other bodies promoting internet user rights
When we talk about the so-called 'end of privacy', we conjure up images of state-run agencies secretly monitoring and recording our every move. Whilst this is the case, the true perpetrator in this permeating culture of intrusion is not a third party; its our very selves. We willingly broadcast every moment of our lives in exchange for a moment's worth of virtual attention. Mendelson, artfully and through personal narratives and journalism, tells the story of how we have undermined one of our greatest societal assets.
Metadata and its uses
Data auctions
The Internet of Things
The use of social media for surveillance and suppression
Just how safe is Cloud technology
The Big Business of Big Data
How online retailers stalk, without permission, their customers
Anonymous and web activism
The internet's dark side: Silk Road, hacking, extortion
EFF and other bodies promoting internet user rights
When we talk about the so-called 'end of privacy', we conjure up images of state-run agencies secretly monitoring and recording our every move. Whilst this is the case, the true perpetrator in this permeating culture of intrusion is not a third party; its our very selves. We willingly broadcast every moment of our lives in exchange for a moment's worth of virtual attention. Mendelson, artfully and through personal narratives and journalism, tells the story of how we have undermined one of our greatest societal assets.
Paperback
Published December 8, 2017
17 people want to read
About the author
B.J. Mendelson
4 books5 followersB.J. Mendelson, is a keynote speaker and author. His books include Social Media Is Bullshit from St. Martin’s Press and Privacy: And How We Can Get It Back from Curious Reads.
Mendelson first received attention in the late 2000s for turning his financial struggles during The Great Recession into media coverage with appearances in The New York Times, Newsweek, The Los Angeles Times, and others.
After building an unsuccessful national breast cancer outreach tour around the advice given by prominent social media marketers — and subsequent success in doing the same tour again the following year by doing the exact opposite of their advice — B.J. went on to write a book called Social Media Is Bullshit based on his experience. He later earned additional media attention for frequently taking on prominent social media experts and companies.
Since 2012, B.J. Mendelson has made presentations at the National Automotive Dealers Association Conference, South By Southwest, Social Media Week: Chicago, The Do Lectures in the U.K., R.O.A.D. in Moscow, the Word of Mouth Marketing Association Summit, Social Media Explore, and various other events to talk about the many myths peddled by social media marketers and what really works online and off.
He appeared at the United Nations to debate the ambassador to Pakistan, Abdullah Hussain Haroon, about the effects of social media on society and its involvement in political revolutions. Mendelson has also appeared on MSNBC, CNBC, CNN, Yahoo! News, the CBC, TechCrunch, The Huffington Post, and numerous other national outlets to talk about these myths and who actually benefits from the hype.
B.J. is also one-half of the creative team behind, “Vengeance, Nevada” and “A National Story of Minor Significance.” Both comics will soon be available through Amazon’s popular Comixology platform.
Mendelson first received attention in the late 2000s for turning his financial struggles during The Great Recession into media coverage with appearances in The New York Times, Newsweek, The Los Angeles Times, and others.
After building an unsuccessful national breast cancer outreach tour around the advice given by prominent social media marketers — and subsequent success in doing the same tour again the following year by doing the exact opposite of their advice — B.J. went on to write a book called Social Media Is Bullshit based on his experience. He later earned additional media attention for frequently taking on prominent social media experts and companies.
Since 2012, B.J. Mendelson has made presentations at the National Automotive Dealers Association Conference, South By Southwest, Social Media Week: Chicago, The Do Lectures in the U.K., R.O.A.D. in Moscow, the Word of Mouth Marketing Association Summit, Social Media Explore, and various other events to talk about the many myths peddled by social media marketers and what really works online and off.
He appeared at the United Nations to debate the ambassador to Pakistan, Abdullah Hussain Haroon, about the effects of social media on society and its involvement in political revolutions. Mendelson has also appeared on MSNBC, CNBC, CNN, Yahoo! News, the CBC, TechCrunch, The Huffington Post, and numerous other national outlets to talk about these myths and who actually benefits from the hype.
B.J. is also one-half of the creative team behind, “Vengeance, Nevada” and “A National Story of Minor Significance.” Both comics will soon be available through Amazon’s popular Comixology platform.
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Displaying 1 - 2 of 2 reviews
November 14, 2023
When reading this book, you might encounter phrases such as "...63 million people willingly voted for Donald Trump to be President, and a lot of those people had college degrees", "Sure, Trump is an *****..." and many more sentences about Trump in the same manner. I don't really care about Trump, but I do not want to read about him in this manner when I am reading about privacy. None of the text about Trump had anything to do with privacy, so why include it throughout the whole book?
The Author is also uninformed about hacking and security, but jet he talks about it in the ill minded manner. He oftentimes says how it was easy for people to get access to your private data AFTER the fact that this data was stolen. He states when describing a real case: "...they wouldn't have had an easily accessible folder called "Passwords" just sitting there for someone else to find." Easily? Really? How easily? Do you know something about it or just trash talk security personnel who works at those companies? And there are a lot of instances where author states how "easy" it was to steal your data.
Then the author thinks that every one us should get paid for our data. This is simply ill minded, because the data about us has only value when there is more people and not just ourselves. Our data, on the individual level, has 0 value. But when there is data on 100'000 people then sure, it is valuable. So the point - "we should be paid for our data" is wrong.
Furthermore, everyone who can Google for 5 minutes should know that there is a much bigger problem in Asian countries. People get evaluated for their jobs, their dates and their banks based on the data they have on them, and they might not give you bank account or a job just based on the data that they collected about you, which involves the things you ordered with your credit card and your general lifestyle. The author of this book never explored that.
The Author is also uninformed about hacking and security, but jet he talks about it in the ill minded manner. He oftentimes says how it was easy for people to get access to your private data AFTER the fact that this data was stolen. He states when describing a real case: "...they wouldn't have had an easily accessible folder called "Passwords" just sitting there for someone else to find." Easily? Really? How easily? Do you know something about it or just trash talk security personnel who works at those companies? And there are a lot of instances where author states how "easy" it was to steal your data.
Then the author thinks that every one us should get paid for our data. This is simply ill minded, because the data about us has only value when there is more people and not just ourselves. Our data, on the individual level, has 0 value. But when there is data on 100'000 people then sure, it is valuable. So the point - "we should be paid for our data" is wrong.
Furthermore, everyone who can Google for 5 minutes should know that there is a much bigger problem in Asian countries. People get evaluated for their jobs, their dates and their banks based on the data they have on them, and they might not give you bank account or a job just based on the data that they collected about you, which involves the things you ordered with your credit card and your general lifestyle. The author of this book never explored that.
January 8, 2025
This book was kinda sloppy. It had weird ramblings I really tried to get through, not at all what I was expecting this book to be about lol. It was just another random library pick up.
Displaying 1 - 2 of 2 reviews