ntouk.com - Jerry Fishenden's technology policy blog

My colleague Linda Criddle - one of the people I most respect in terms of their expertise and understanding of online Internet risks - has written a book: "look both ways". And about time too!

It's all about how to protect yourself and your family on the Internet.

If you want a flavour of Linda's insights - particularly around the risks children can expose themselves to on the Internet - there's a good interview with her in the Seattle Times right here. If you've never really thought about it, consider this from the interview:

Criddle showed me photos taken from one girl's page: One shows her sitting in front of her house, another shows the view from the porch. Pretty boring.

But look, Criddle said: You can see how old she is. There's a school name on her shirt. A number on the house. A distinctive building, a street sign.

"Lose the house number," Criddle said. "Change the T-shirt."

Aside from the obvious risks that many teenagers don't even think about, there's the more "mundane" criminal side: knowing where you live and that you're currently away (thanks to your own blog or that of one of your friends) has a high value. Such a high value in fact that trawling the Internet for this type of information ("MySpace fraud") and then selling it on to criminal gangs is a notable trend.

... it took Linda Criddle just 20 seconds to find the woman's address and phone number; 20 more to get a satellite photo of her house.

That the woman was in grief and therefore vulnerable with a 9-year-old daughter at home, well, Criddle didn't have to look that up. It was all over the woman's online diary.

So Criddle called the woman to warn her against what we jokingly call TMI too much information but what predators might call pay dirt.

So it's not just kids: it's all of us. The Internet is a truly transformational tool. But we all need to understand how we can manage the risks.

Check out Linda's book.

Internet security privacy technology policy Microsoft