Transparency vs. Privacy
GP
Public
Seen by 10
Hello everyone, I have found a very important dilemma, so it'd be a good opportunity to use this Loomio platform again.
I've been experimenting with an open-source tracking system called Piwik. It works wonders. With just a tiny simple code in the forum's template, we can get rich information about visitors' location, operating system, visited pages, Web browser, visit time, etc. Even the ISP! It's the best statistics platform I've ever used.
Now, there we come with the problem. There are actually three options here:
- To not use Piwik.
- To use Piwik, but give access only to the admins.
- To use Piwik and make the insights public.
Option 1 would be preferred if we're not comfortable with the idea of our information being collected for a statistical purpose, or if we simply don't find the need to use the platform.
Option 2 would be preferred if we are interested in using the platform to improve the forums, but don't really like the idea of having our info accessible to everyone in the world.
Option 3 would be preferred if we want to be as transparent as possible and believe in the need to self-reflect on our usage trends in order to have a better glimpse of the future.
So, what do you think?
Poll Created Sat 27 Sep 2014 11:25PM
Should we track visitors on the forums? Closed Tue 30 Sep 2014 11:07PM
NO: Since there's a lack of interest, violations of privacy fears and no concrete proof that stats are useful/needed, I will retreat the tracking system from the forums' code.
Note that the tracking system gathers the following data: country, OS, Internet service provider, browser, visited pages, visit time.
Agree: Yes, tracking visitors' information would be useful to gather in order to improve the forums.
Disagree: No, tracking such information from visitors is creepy and/or useless.
Results
| Results | Option | % of points | Voters | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
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Agree | 0.0% | 0 | |
| Abstain | 66.7% | 2 |
|
|
| Disagree | 33.3% | 1 |
|
|
| Block | 0.0% | 0 | ||
| Undecided | 0% | 9 |
|
3 of 12 people have participated (25%)
Byte2222
Sun 28 Sep 2014 5:53PM
I feel like the data would not be useful enough to warrant the invasion of privicy
GP
Sun 28 Sep 2014 7:18PM
Statistical data is useful for planning, but I'm afraid it might violate some people's definition of "Internet privacy", even though I think that this expression is a lie.
GP Sun 28 Sep 2014 11:59AM
@seb1
True, it did spark a little discussion ;-) However, what might cause some inconfort is that the stats are in real time, so we can kind of guess who is who. But if country, ISP, OS, browser, visited pages and visit time fits with your definition of 'anonymous', then it's fine! ;-)
Seb Sun 28 Sep 2014 1:42PM
Ah, I wasn't aware it was in real-time :P
The details were still rather broad in the fashion you shared them. Surely any stranger wouldn't be able to decipher individual identities with the provided info alone?
I'm not as incredibly strict with my internet privacy as some people, but I realise it could be a concern to others.
GP Sun 28 Sep 2014 4:54PM
The only thing someone could do would be to relate a visitor (country, ISP, OS, Web browser, visited pages, visit time) to his forum membership.
For example, one could notice that an Australian visitor, who visited X, Y and Z pages on the forums for a period of 12 minutes on his iPad... is actually you Seb :P
Dark_Link_13_ Sun 28 Sep 2014 5:28PM
I don't know about having them public to everyone, but maybe only to members or just to the admins.
I'd be fine with that.
Byte2222 Sun 28 Sep 2014 5:58PM
This is an ethical issue. This information is gathered without the user's consent, even if it is freely available. I consider that to be an invasion of privacy. We could debate whether it would be worth it but I feel like this is not a matter to be debated and that we must respect our members' privacy as a moral obligation. It doesn't matter whether the staff or everyone have access to the data - merely collecting it is a very shady act in my opinion.
GP Sun 28 Sep 2014 7:15PM
@darklink13
In my opinion, the logic behind Internet sharing should be the following: If I don't want anyone to have access to something, then no one should have access to it. Creating an account for everyone who we accept to share the data with and blocking the rest of the people would be unfair.
@byte2222
I agree with the moral obligation of respecting our members' privacy, but it did give us some useful information. For example, mobile browsing is still irrelevant, since it represents well less than 10% of the total visits (Android is at 6%). Also, 65% of visitors spend less than 11 seconds on the forums. Finally, we get an average of 61 visitors per day.
Another question we could ask ourselves is whether there is anything else that could be useful. My guess is no.
Just to add as a general detail, any website can collect such information secretly. It's so well done that the tracking system even offers to track people using an invisible image! That's why Do Not Track was created and I encourage anyone who is interested in keeping their privacy private to enable it on your browser.
Seb · Sun 28 Sep 2014 7:22AM
It isn't anything super-private, and I assume it's anonymous anyway. The info gives some interesting insight into statistical info, so I think it should be available to everyone. Look at the first time you made the data public- we had a light discussion about web browsers!
I'm not the one making the decision though, so I wouldn't mind which direction this decision takes.