Last week the Internet was buzzing about “Girls Around Me” a mobile app that allowed the user to see profiles of girls that were geographically nearby - as in at the bar next door. Using publicly visible Facebook profiles and Foursquare, the app enables the user to see where someone is, where they have been, their full Facebook profile, including birthdate, school attended, favorites, family members, photo albums, depending on the person’s privacy settings on Facebook.
It’s only March and it has already been a very busy year for privacy professionals. In January, Viviane Reding, Vice President of the European Commission, announced a proposal to reform the European Union’s data protection framework. On this side of the Atlantic, the White House recently released a lengthy paper titled “Consumer Data Privacy in a Networked World” with the intent of finally launching comprehensive federal privacy legislation in the United States.
