Illegal immigration is a big problem in the U.S. today and is growing worse by the day. American citizens are losing jobs everyday to their illegal counterparts who will work for much less than they will. While minimum wage is what the lowest income Americans live with, for people of less developed countries, this money is unlike anything they have ever seen  before. Think about it from an employer’s perspective; you have two workers, and one will work for less money; who do you pick? The answer is obvious, as money is everyone’s number one concern.

The public has remained quiet about this problem for some time, but the downturn in the economy has made getting a job and holding one much more difficult. The U.S. is discussing the implementation of biometric cards to verify that all employees are legitimate citizens. They propose to use iris scans or maybe fingerprint scans that would require every employee to sign in at the beginning of every day and especially for job interviews.

The plan also proposes to step up immigration security and make it more difficult for someone to infiltrate the U.S.’s borders. For workers who are illegal but have been in the U.S. for some time, they will offer naturalization processes that are normally only available to legitimate immigrants.

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The city of Los Angeles has proposed a multi-million dollar buyout of all sorts of Internet information: e-mail, personal information, even police records. They propose to use Google to find all of this information; essentially tap Google’s unlimited database. Although the city wishes to buy everything for noble reasons like criminal tracking and other crime deterrents, the public worries for its loss of privacy.

Paul Weber, who spearheads the Los Angeles Police Protective League, says that he himself is worried. He says that his unit has little knowledge on what the plan fully entails, and they are quite worried about what the repercussions on the public’s privacy will be. He is especially worried about the release of confidential police records and other criminal data.

He was right, and not the only one worried. The online messaging giant Twitter sent out a message to be careful when using Google, because they frequently use “cloud computing”: storing files online rather than in their direct control. This allows the data to be much easier to hack and get into. Twitter isn’t the only one to have this concern though, but it a novel event that one huge company calls out another.

This shift from keeping data and information online is useful, as it cleans up the massive amount of space needed to store all of this data, but it represents many security issues. For one, the whole thing would be accessed by a username and password system, so if a hacker got either, he could be on his way into a gold mine of information. This is also amplified by the fact that many people link their accounts together, so if a hacker gained access to one account, he could actually be getting into many accounts. Also, there are not as many layers of security that prevent an interloper from gaining access.

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Invasion of Privacy is a number of things. First of all, privacy is indeed a law, and one all citizens of the U.S. are entitled to.

Most of the time, invasion of privacy applies to celebrity and other public figures. Basically it represents their freedom from excessive media intrusion into their lives, and are often represented in celebrity libel cases. These often have to do with celebrities being portrayed in a negative or untrue manner, and unfortunately, often fail. The celebrities file them, but the rarely win, since it is just seen as a way of life to be stalked as a prominent public figure.

As an average citizen though, do not think these laws don’t apply to you. You have every right to privacy that these A-listers do as well. Some may think “why even bother? My privacy isn’t being invaded…” This may be true; surely you are not finding slander about John Doe on the front of People magazine, but that is not to say you are being invaded in other ways.

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Some people are unaccustomed to privacy. Many adults will speak of their idyllic hometowns where everyone knew everyone, windows had no curtains, and nobody had any secrets. They will reminisce about dialing the phone operator and asking for someone just by their first name and getting connected, Some even assert that no one used to lock their doors, and children played completely unsupervised in the streets.

In today’s society these “old-style” values are a bit antiquated, and do not apply. Today’s home environment is a large municipal district where it would be impossible to know everyone, dialing a phone operator and asking for someone by first name would garner rude laughs, and people spend top-dollar outfitting their houses with special locks and other security measures. One would be hard pressed to find children playing in the street unsupervised, for fear of the massive amount of traffic hitting them, or just being kidnapped.

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Ever since cookies were introduced to surfers of the web, there has been two contrasting values perpetrating the Internet. One side was fully benevolent, and offered users ads tailored to their every need, and including products they might actually want, instead of the completely random bombardment of ads. All around this would create a more personalized, and just generally better surfing environment. The dark side to all of this is the tracking, and ruthless storage of information about your online life, and the possibility of all of this information to become known.

Online advertisement agencies have always had a spotted past with privacy laws and their invasion due to the behavioral advertising practices, (where they browse your history to figure out what you are interested in) and the fact that much of this is done with no permission and often without the consumer’s knowledge.

They need to change soon though, because people and lawmakers are complaining. Two subcommittees in the House are meeting this week to discuss implementing more stringent privacy laws as far as online advertising goes. The House has polled major Internet giants such as Yahoo, FaceBook, and MySpace, and found that many of them have very flawed and inadequate privacy guarantees. The people have spoken too; those polled confess they are unsure about how well they are being protected and usually completely unsure of their rights to privacy. Needless to say, the House is almost dead-set on increasing guidelines and enforcing them more strictly.

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Some believe that a proxy server is the cure-all solution to internet privacy problems. If it is used correctly, and the proxy is a reliable one, then this is a true statement. Oftentimes though, if a criminal proxy is selected, this can be the end of your internet anonymity.

Internet crime has skyrocketed. The ability to commit crimes on the web is a much safer alternative than actually breaking into someone’s house and stealing. This way, the criminal can’t be caught at the crime scene; he is countries away!

The ability to commit crime and steal people’s information on the Internet is simple. For example, viewing somebody’s public FaceBook or Myspace profile is bound to net you all sorts of useful information about them; location, pictures, affiliations, school, etc. It’ll just be a short time before their Social Security Number is posted on their profile for everyone to swoon over and leave comments on.

The point is, the Internet makes it way to easy for criminals. Most of your surfing is done with simple HTTP requests, which is completely readable; not encrypted whatsoever. If they can’t get you this way, they turn to their next cultural meme for advice: “If you build it, they will come.” If they start a proxy server, millions of surfers will flock in to seek anonymity while browsing the web.

That was a critical mistake. Instead of hiding their information, they pretty much left it on the hacker’s doorstep, tied in a pretty bow. The owner of a proxy can see all of the sensitive information that flows through it, and if the owner is an identity thief…. You get the idea.

You know the old saying “nothing in this world is free”? Well, that could be altered to be a bit more accurate: “nothing GOOD in this world is free”. There are free proxy servers out there, but unless you want to be the next true story in an identity theft article, you should just pay the minimal monthly fee and get the security of a true elite anonymous proxy.

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The Chinese government won’t budge on their resolution that all computers to be sold in China will contain censoring software. In fact, it seems they are going even further! They are thinking about recruiting some 10,000 people to be Internet monitors; find bad sites and report them.

The plan was offered up for discussion on Tuesday. This goal is to create a system that can “purify society.”

They are definitely on the offensive. One group, the China Illegal Internet Information Reporting Center, has been seeking out sites and warning them to take down their offensive content. They are afraid of no one, even going after the Chinese Google for hosting vulgar images and sexual content!

China has always had a history of interfering with people’s freedom rights by censoring and blocking content deemed inappropriate, or harmful to their Communist party. Internet-savvy citizens can easily get around these blocks through a myriad of ways, but this new computer installation software could prevent them from doing so any longer, and they are up in arms.

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In Beijing, a 21-year old girl stabbed and killed an official of the Communist Party as he tried to force himself upon her. Normally this story would have stayed low and local, and the girl would have been charged with manslaughter in a discreet case, but the Internet has changed all of that.

When the story got posted online that the girl was going to be charged on a count of manslaughter, outrage among the public broke out. The Internet community was so against this decision that, to quell the e-riot, Chinese officials had to censor and ban vehement online comments.

Under intense public pressure, the court exonerated the girl of any manslaughter charges and declared her free to go. The Internet is a medium to tell the plight of forgotten mistreated and not allow them to be pigeonholed, and this is a prime example of this truth. The courts wanted to put this girl away because it was a Communist official, but the people would allow none of that injustice. Bob Dylan was right, the times are a’ changing.

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With the digital age going strong and a new administration in the White House, now is the perfect time to enact legislation and regulations concerning the Internet. TechCrunch recently published (courtesy of the Washington Post) an article outlining a Digital Bill of Rights to protect Internet users and consumers.  Most of the laws that govern the Internet are in need of a major overhaul due to all the advances in technology.  Basically they need to keep up with the changes.  If laws weren’t changed concerning the United States Postal Service, we’d all still be waiting for our mail to be delivered on horseback.  Imagine what it would be like if those old laws were still being used even with our modern delivery service.  Mail service would be unreliable, chaotic and ineffective.  The same situation we face digitally today.

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If you thought you have privacy when you’re surfing the ‘net, you’re sadly mistaken. Every site you visit, every email you send, goes through the server of your ISP. As you might have heard recently on the news, the only way to guarantee your security is to use an anonymous proxy. It sounds mysterious, doesn’t it? First, you need to know why you may need one.

According to Colorado Law School professor Paul Ohm, there may be more to worry about than we know. Ohm says, “…almost no other entity poses a greater threat to privacy than the ISP.” While some Internet users are aware of this, most haven’t entertained any major concerns about all their private information that is transmitted. Up until now, ISPs haven’t had the technology to really play around with people’s privacy.

Those are the operative words: up until now. Deep packet inspection gear is being developed by several software companies that can not only collect this data, it can sort it so it can be sold to advertisers so you can be targeted by marketers preying on your harvested interests. The companies with this software are offering large amounts of cash to ISPs for this information. What ISP company is going to want to turn down money? Another aspect is that the government, in the interests of being able to wiretap a user’s Internet data if they are suspected of acting against this country, has required ISPs to install this kind of gear. Just in case.

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