Sunday, August 08, 2004
Share your snaps - whether you want to or not...
Another example of how we leave traces of personal data everywhere, often without realising. It would seem that at least one Kodak photo printing kiosk (you know the sort - insert memory card and print) has been letting punters select "Previous Pictures" and hey presto, serving up the snaps taken by the person who last used the machine. Kodak claim that this feature shoud be disabled, and that the branch of Boots in question must have re-enabled it, but why did the kiosks ever have this function in the first place? Why would the kiosk ever need to store the pictures it just printed? Why would it ever need to re-use them? Why would this feature ever be enabled for public use? Kodak try and shift the blame, but I have serious concerns about the original design. It hardly seems as if the privacy and security of the user are being treated with the utmost respect, does it? And if one machine does this, it's likely there are more out there doing the same thing. Taking your pictures somewhere to be developed or printed is one of those trust relationships that we count on without giving it too much thought. We'd be outraged if we thought the developing staff were passing out copies of our holiday snaps to the next customer. We should be able to count on the same kind of trust when using an automated service.
Another example of how we leave traces of personal data everywhere, often without realising. It would seem that at least one Kodak photo printing kiosk (you know the sort - insert memory card and print) has been letting punters select "Previous Pictures" and hey presto, serving up the snaps taken by the person who last used the machine. Kodak claim that this feature shoud be disabled, and that the branch of Boots in question must have re-enabled it, but why did the kiosks ever have this function in the first place? Why would the kiosk ever need to store the pictures it just printed? Why would it ever need to re-use them? Why would this feature ever be enabled for public use? Kodak try and shift the blame, but I have serious concerns about the original design. It hardly seems as if the privacy and security of the user are being treated with the utmost respect, does it? And if one machine does this, it's likely there are more out there doing the same thing. Taking your pictures somewhere to be developed or printed is one of those trust relationships that we count on without giving it too much thought. We'd be outraged if we thought the developing staff were passing out copies of our holiday snaps to the next customer. We should be able to count on the same kind of trust when using an automated service.
Comments:
I have similar concerns about chip-and-pin cards. They are more secure IF you trust the technology - but if a dodgy shop with some technical knowledge doctors their machine, it would be easy to capture both the card number and pin number, and then you'd be in all sorts of trouble.
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