Guard Your Personal Information - In This World, It Is Your Life

October 12 2007 by The Systemic Analyst.

The International Herald Tribune has published an insightful article on personal data retention:

As long as we are willing to relinquish some personal data, Web applications have long allowed us to create virtual identities that can conduct most of the social and financial transactions that typify life in the real world.

But the newest generation of these services is starting to collect and store far more than just the standard suite of identity data — name and address, phone, Social Security or credit-card numbers — that populates the databases of banks and credit-card processors. They increasingly store information, generated by us, that is directly linked to those virtual identities.

And users are loving them.

For example, the start-up Mint.com won this year’s TechCrunch award for its Swiss Army knife approach to personal financial management. In exchange for customers uploading their account information and allowing sponsors to offer them specialized services, Mint will connect nightly to their credit-card providers, banks and credit unions. Then it automatically updates transactions and accounts, balances their checkbooks, categorizes their transactions, compares cash with debt and, based on their personal spending habits, shops for better rates on new accounts and credit cards. Click here for more.

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