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Choice of ELGG
Choice of ELGG
Okay, I know . . . I'm excessively chatty today. But, I was just reading this and thought it relevant to this group. It comes from Terry Anderson's Edublog:
Identity exposure is especially relevant to institutional use of networks where restriction of access of data is often controlled by legislation. In my own institution, I have had to argue that although we are not authorized to release personal information about our students, we also do not have the right to deny a person their right to expose data about themselves. Since degree of concern over privacy is very much an individual variable, it seems the only solution to these concerns is to let learners control directly the degree of exposure they wish over their own information. This capacity to control permissions to both postings and personal data (accessible to everyone, including search engines, no one as a private diary, to those registered students, to those in a program or class, to only two or three designated friends) is the major reason why we have chosen the ELGG.ORG software suite to support social learning trails at Athabasca University. (View original article.)
Thoughts?
M
Replies
- Debbie Basey June 9, 2008 - 7:33pm
Before my present position as the Field Learning Manager, I was in charge of the Commuter / Technical training for the RCMP for British Columbia. Within this program are three Internet Investigator courses: Basic, Intermediate, and Advanced. The instructor is awesome and he showed how easy it is to gather information about someone from on-line sources with the intent to steal one's identity, target them for an illegal charity scam, etc. It has made me very aware of what information about myself that I should or should not be putting on-line. Did you know that if someone has your birthdate and your Mother's maiden name they can get a copy of the SIN card. And that is just the start. Anything is possible after that information is available. I want to tell every geneoligical web site to get their information off of the web. They are putting themselves in grave danger of identity theft.
But with that being said, I think there are still safe way to interact on-line. Hopefully, if one sets up their social sites appropriately, it can give the opportunity for safe social networking.
- M Koole June 9, 2008 - 11:02pm
Holy cow! It's that easy? Just with a birthday and mother's maiden name . . . scary, isn't it?
