Mainstream media are having a field day scaring consumers into thinking that criminals are preying on users of social networks that disclose their geographic locations. The idea is that you “check in” with a service like Brightkite or Foursquare, letting your friends know you are at a restaurant, the office, the gym, etc., and this alerts criminals that you are away from home so they can burglarize you. There have even been some widely publicized incidents in which this has happened.

“God damn Foursquare! I’m ruined!” Image: neophobic.ro

The latest round of site traffic-building scare tactics was spurred by Please Rob Me, a web site that lists people who disclose through social networks that they have left their homes. And according to confused.com:

“Darren Black, head of home insurance at Confused.com, says ‘criminals are becoming increasingly sophisticated in their information gathering, even using Google Earth and Street View to plan their burglaries with military precision’…He added that home insurance providers assessing claims are starting to take information revealed on the sites into account, noting that ‘we may, in (the) future, see insurers declining claims if they believe the customer is negligent’.”

Come on, folks. This is War of the Worlds-style panic. It’s too early for law enforcement to compile this data, but I would guess the percentage of crimes made possible by social network-derived information is statistically insignificant. The only thing that makes sense about this is the idea that insurance companies would be excited about a new way to deny consumer claims.

Do you still drive a car to work or school? Or walk to the bus stop? Because any one of these activities signals potential burglars that you are not home. And in fact, these indicators are much more accurate than a social network check-in, which can be faked or time delayed.

Are there privacy risks to using so-called location-based services? Absolutely. If you’re an adult, for example, you should never check in at home (except with services like Rally that are smart enough to hide the user’s home location), and never check in at your kids’ schools, karate studio, friends’ houses, etc. Letting people know about your schedule and destinations might be foolish. Letting them know how to track your kids is stupid.

For the sake of decorum, don’t check in at the movies or a bar when you’ve called in sick at work. Don’t check in at a competitor’s location. Don’t check in at a rehab center. Use some common sense.

One of the few people who have the right ideas about privacy is Charlene Li, former Forrester analyst and founder of the Altimeter Group, who calls Google’s new “Buzz” a “parental control nightmare.” After taking Buzz away from her children, Li checked out Google’s Terms of Service for Buzz and:

“discovered that buried in Google’s terms of service somewhere is that children under the age of 13 are not allowed to have Gmail accounts. But unlike Facebook, which requires that people enter their birthdates when setting up accounts, Google makes no such attempt to educate people signing up for Gmail that such a provision is in place.”

And my advice for younger kids using location-based services is, “Don’t your parents pay any attention to what you are doing? You shouldn’t be on Foursquare!”

Anyone who thinks Terms of Service will keep younger users from signing up for online services is deluded or lazy. As Li describes it, she tries to stay ahead of her kids by being informed about new services as they are released.

The bottom line is that privacy is a complicated matter. True social network privacy protection can only happen when a number of things are in alignment:

• Developers of social networks and services need to be more responsible about privacy protections and put the safety of consumers, particularly young people, ahead of advertisers’ needs
• Any compromise of privacy, release of information, or connection to another site or service, should only be done with full, open disclosure to the consumer and the opportunity to decline
• Social network new user registration should by default give the user 100% of the privacy protection available on the site, with the option to knowingly and affirmatively remove protections solely at the user’s discretion
• Users must take the time to read and understand the Terms of Service and privacy controls for a site
• Parents need to keep an open conversation going with their children, and educate themselves as to the potential exposure of any new technology

Don’t panic. The Martians aren’t really coming. As Marshall McLuhan said, “Innumerable confusions and a feeling of despair invariably emerge in periods of great technological and cultural transition.”

Tags: Foursquare, location-based services, Google Buzz, privacy, please rob me