Erin Biro

Where Does Your Business Host Its Email?

2011-05-06T08:04:00.000-07:00

PIPEDA & Canadian Consumers – Where Does Your Business Host Its Email?

Posted by imogokate on April 15, 2011
Thank you to Kate - http://www.imogoblog.wordpress.com/

While last Friday’s post (PIPEDA & Client Data Security – How the Canadian Privacy Acts Impacts the Cloud) briefly touched on the the class action lawsuit filed against CIBC in 2004 by Canadian Visa cardholders when they learned their data was available to US authorities via the Patriot Act, this was not the only time that Canadian consumers have acted litigiously in regards to their data being stored south of the border. While PIPEDA and similar provincial regulations allow the storage of Canadian information on international soil, it is obvious that Canadian consumers are not comfortable with foreign governments having complete access to their correspondence and account data.

In 2008, canada.com email subscribers brought the parent company CanWest to court, when the provider decided to outsource the service to a third-party US firm. From the PIPEDA Case Summary 2008-394 –

Two complainants expressed doubt that subscribers’ personal information was adequately protected after canada.com e-mail operations were outsourced to a U.S.-based firm. Moreover, the complainants did not believe that existing subscribers had had an opportunity to consent to the transfer of their information to the U.S. or that new subscribers were properly informed that their information would be used and stored in the U.S.
The Office of the Privacy Commissioner of Canada recognizes and shares the continued interest that Canadians and Canadian businesses have in the flow of their personal information beyond our borders….
The present Case Summary addresses several of the same issues and summarizes the Office’s position:
The Personal Information Protection and Electronic Documents Act (the Act) does not prohibit organizations from outsourcing their operations across international borders.
It is important for organizations to assess the risks that could jeopardize the security and confidentiality of customer personal information when it is transferred to foreign-based third-party service providers. The measures by which personal information is protected by a foreign-based firm must be formalized with the organization by using contractual or other means.
No contract or contractual provision can override the laws of a country to which the information could be subject once the information has been transferred.
Organizations must be transparent about their personal information handling practices. A company in Canada that outsources personal information processing to a company that operates in another country should notify its customers that the information may be available to the government of that country or its agencies under a lawful order made in that country.
With regard to the issue of customer consent, the Office has taken the position that the sharing of information with a third-party service provider constitutes a “use” for the purposes of the Act…. Although service providers may change over time, if the purpose of the current provider’s use of the personal information has remained the same, organizations are not required to obtain renewed customer consent for the information use.

The Office’s investigation established that existing subscribers were informed in advance that their new log-in to their account would be an opportunity for them to accept or reject the terms of the services. New e-mail subscribers were also informed, both of information transfers to the U.S.-based provider and of potential privacy implications.
The Assistant Privacy Commissioner was satisfied that canada.com had fulfilled its obligations to provide comparable protection under the Act by putting in place adequate contractual provisions. She noted that since the third party in this case is a U.S. company operating in that country, it is subject to U.S. laws, some of which could compel that company to disclose to U.S. authorities information in its possession.

While the courts did rule on the side of the email provider, what is interesting to note (at least as a Canadian consumer of email products) is that these email users had been offered the choice to either have their email moved to the US email provider’s servers or have their accounts and all of their associated data deleted entirely — neither an option that many of us would find palatable and certainly not if those accounts contained business correspondence. The question becomes whether Canadian businesses (and solo entrepeneurs) should be using internationally based email providers, given consumer sentiment about government interference with their data (and the US Patriot Act in particular) or whether they should be investigating Canada-based email solutions like ImogoMail?
As a business owner, do you know where your business data email is stored? As a Canadian consumer, do you privacy concerns about how businesses use and store account data? We’d love to hear about it in the comments!
Want to learn more about where Imogo stores its data? Visit the RackForce Gigacenter – environmentally powered and securely located in the heart of British Columbia.

The Gum Boot Shuffle

2011-05-04T08:51:00.000-07:00

The Gum Boot Shuffle

This week we share a message from one truly amazing individual, W Mitchell. Mitchell and his example truly show us that all barriers are self imposed.
So many barriers we are told are real, don’t exist at all. And even the real ones can be vanquished through sheer effort. Things like picking up a quarter with no fingers or having a wonderful, accomplished life though you are bummed and in a wheelchair – most can be surmounted through effort and a willingness to dig under them, go around them, hop over them.
“It is courage the world needs, not infallibility,courage is always the surest wisdom.” (Sir Wilfred Grenfell)
I first met Tony Robbins when I spoke at a seminar he was running in Phoenix. The highlight of the seminar was to be the firewalk, where you stroll barefoot over red hot coals.
Three days after I arrived, firewalk night rolled around. Three beds of mesquite coals were prepared, ranging from twelve to forty feet long. This was the hottest fire Tony had ever used. I was about eight feet away and the heat was so intense, I was worried it would somehow mess up the plastic surgery work that had just been done on me, so I had them back me up.

I planned only to watch, for a couple of reasons. First, I don't walk. Second, I had had my fire experience. Third, I didn't need this routine anyway. The whole idea behind this is that if you can walk on fire, you prove to yourself that you can do damn near anything, that any limitations in your life are probably self-imposed. I had already figured that out in my own way, so who needed this?
My first fire 'walk'...
People started walking through the coals. As they emerged, they were exultant. No one was burned. I'd guess 250 people did it.

I don't even remember how it came about but suddenly, there I was at the end of this bed of coals in my wheelchair, taking off my shoes and socks and saying to Tony and another friend, Tom Crum, “One of you grab me under the right arm, one under the left, lift me up and turn me around, because we are going to do this backwards. And that's what we did.

I had more contact with the coals than anyone else. While the other workshop participants had stepped through the coals, I was literally dragged through thern. When we got to the other side, I could see the two dark trails where my heels had gone. I did not have a single burn. What did it mean?
A lot of scientists are skeptical that anything mystical is involved. There are elaborate theories about perspiration on the feet repelling the heat, through a principle similar to touching a wet finger to a hot iron and not being burned. These theories might be true – although I was in contact for quite a while.

But even if it is not literal magic, it certainly is a potent metaphor. It is a visible illustration of the power anyone has to face when confronted by a frightening barrier and discovering that there was no real reason to fear it at all.

I firmly believe that most barriers are self-imposed. We first get them from society – you can't do that, that's immoral, that's crazy, no one in our family does that and so on. But we forget that we have the power to accept or reject these barriers. We treat them as if they are immovable, immutable, when, in fact, they may be silly, cause unnecessary misery or just be plain nonexistent.
To illustrate this with one more vivid example: back in the 1950s, it was widely accepted that no one would ever run a four-minute mile – that was, simply, something that human beings were not capable of doing. Then, in 1954, Roger Bannister ran one in three minutes, fifty nine and four-tenths' seconds. The next year, some fifty people broke the four-minute “barrier.” Now, high school athletes break it routinely. Bannister demonstrated that the barrier was not real, but the remarkable thing is that any of those fifty people could have figured it out on their own. They didn't need to wait for Bannister to show them the fallacy of it.
An even more poignant example, and one closer to all of your hearts I'm sure, is the story of Cliff Young, a rather unsuccessful sixty-five-year old farmer from Australia, who showed up at the starting line of the annual five hundred kilometer Sydney to Melbourne race. Hundreds of people show up at the start of that race every year, but this was the first time anyone had arrived in his gum boots and bib overalls, causing the more polite of the bystanders to smile and the ruder ones to ridicule the old guy.

They were still hooting as the gun sounded and the runners zoomed ahead of Cliff. He didn't even run correctly. He just shuffled along in his gum boots. And at night, when the six hour break came (which everyone knew you had to take to have the stamina to win), Cliff was too stupid even to understand that. When he finally arrived at the break point, he just kept running. And that was the last any of the other runners ever saw of him. Cliff Young broke the Sydney to Melbourne record by some 12 hours and no one was laughing anymore.
Now, everybody's shuffling...
By the next year, everyone was shuffling like Cliff Young. It became the preferred style of ultralong distance running. Quite a few people broke Cliff's record, thanks to what they learned from him.
I had already discovered this: it's the folks who don't pay attention to what “everybody knows” who often succeed in life.
But it was wonderful to see the faces of the 250 people who walked through the firepit that night. I suspected that, from that point on, it would be difficult to convince any of them that he or she faced an insurmountable obstacle.

This is not to say that every obstacle can simply be “walked across” like that firepit. Often, tremendous energy and hard work are required, and the obstacle may need to be surmounted in a way no one could have guessed.

Have a great week unless you choose otherwise.
Drago

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Zig Ziglar's Success Habits: Your Journey to the Top

2011-05-03T14:28:00.001-07:00

Zig Ziglar's Success Habits: Your Journey to the Top

Personal development icon Zig Ziglar told SUCCESS in October 2008, "I'm a constant learner. You need to be a constant student because things change and you have to change and grow. And I emphasize the word grow," he says. Here are Zig Ziglar's five habits for your journey to the top:

1. Be a constant leader. Seek out information that you can learn and teach to others.

2. Encourage others and help them get what they want.

3. Express gratitude. "Gratitude is the healthiest of all human emotions," Ziglar says. "The more you express gratitude for what you have, the more likely you will have even more to express gratitude for."

4. Recognize the value of relationships and their role in creating balanced success.

5. Be consistent in your words and actions. "When you make a promise, keep it."

Near field communication transforms travel in Japan

2011-05-02T09:19:00.000-07:00

Near field communication transforms

travel in Japan

Michael Fitzpatrick, BBC News, Tokyo, Friday April 29, 2011

You will find their like plastered all over Japan. This one is printed on a Tokyo bus stop, so she clicks the camera shutter and peers happily at the result.

Her prize? A timetable appears instantly on the phone's screen, plus the estimated arrival time of the next bus.

When the oddly retro-style bus arrives, she uses her phone to pay by swiping at the front as a Londoner might flutter an Oyster smartcard on entering the Tube.

Ahead of the curve

This is travel Tokyo-style.

And although these types of convenient dodges are slowly appearing in the West (those information-laden barcode tattoos are known as QR codes in the UK, and e-wallets are appearing on phones outside Japan), the country has been experimenting with such technology for more than five years now, and more advanced travel guiding tech besides.

So where better to examine the props that will dominate all our traveller and travel industry tomorrows?

Granted, an Anglo-Saxon smartphone, an iPhone, a Google phone and their ilk can be handy on the road but they lack, so far, many of the tools so useful to travellers in Japan on their so-called feature phones.

With the right clam-shell, iridescent "keitai", subscribers get a seriously high-resolution camera, a projector, and the all-important radio chip that works as a train/air/entrance ticket/boarding pass.

This radio tag can also check you into hotels and even open the room's door for you.

They also act as e-wallets. With up to 50,000 yen credit siphoned into the phone, customers use it to buy groceries at convenience stores, pay the taxi driver and persuade Japan's ubiquitous vending machines to cough up.

Flights of fancy

Japan

's leading airline, All Nippon Airways (ANA), has been using such e-wallets to compete with the country's formidably fast trains for more than five years.

"The major drawback of flying compared to train travel is, of course, the time spent at the airport," says ANA spokesman Ryosei Nomura.

"With ANA's all-in-one ticket and boarding pass in your phone, you can arrive and board your plane within 15 minutes."

Dubbed SKiP, the service relies on Osaifu-Keitai (literally "wallet mobile") technology developed by comms giant NTT.

As the NFC [near field communication] chip-based tech relies on dedicated readers which are available only in a few other countries besides Japan, the service so far applies just to domestic flights.

Users could even conceivably buy their air ticket using their phone at a convenience store with such readers.

The system has a number of advantages over plastic smart cards, too, such as being able to automatically recharge credit via the internet, says Mr Nomura.

With GPS in mobiles as standard, years ahead of the UK, the keitai has also evolved into a seriously useful navigation tool here.

Something called the Total Navigation site does exactly what it says on the tin, using 3D-rendered info on your screen. Hold it in your grip and the phone vibrates telling you when to turn.

Just as well: you need all the hand-holding you can get in the vastness of a capital without street names like Tokyo.

Deciphering menus

Tech also comes to the aid of the linguistically challenged.

Despite the cosmopolitan nature of Tokyo, menus are invariably in Japanese. So to have a phone that snaps a potential meal and describes in English what it is - mock-up meals are only sometimes displayed in the window - is obviously a godsend.

Keitai .... have become touchstones for survival.”

With some restaurant businesses this is catching on, as Japan looks to foreign tourists for badly needed revenue.

Other applications allow you to bring up menus, reviews and translations by other users just by focusing your mobile's camera at the restaurant itself.

Visitors to Japan can try out some of these services by renting domestic phones at the airports. Unfortunately, not all such resources are available on the airport pick-up phones.

But your correspondent was able to attempt a cashless journey from Tokyo through Kyoto to Fukuoka in the south starting with Ana's SKiP service for flights. No maps, no guides, just the omnipotent keitai.

The all-in-one nature of the mobile makes this possible, as does Japan's bent for convenience.

'Swiss army knife'

Such cramped, intensely urban, highly stressful lifestyles have made the Japanese super-reliant on, and worshipful, of convenience, says Ama Chan.

Keitai are the totems of that reverence and have become touchstones for survival. The keitai rules.

Travellers of the near future may want to emulate the light-footed Japanese, shearing off excess baggage such as guidebooks, laptops, camera - even books - and depending solely on the Swiss army knife of the road warrior - the keitai.

In Kyoto, the Hyatt Regency has started the ball rolling with an iPhone rental service that knows where guests are and beams text, video and graphics to inform, help and guide them.

"Of course many overseas visitors bring their smartphones with them, but most don't have a data plan that makes it economic sense to use their phone for downloads," says the hotel's manager Ken Yokoyama.

"The next step was to augment the service with tips from the concierge.

"After that we would like to develop a phone-based service that will think and act like a concierge, to give simple advice - where to eat, for example. The next step after that will be to totally personalise that service."

Mr Yokoyama envisages a massive database covering all Kyoto'a concierge knowledge melding into one serious, well-informed, location-specific travel application laid within the compass of the traveller's hand.

Real-world view

Augmenting city guides will not stop there. Something called "augmented reality" (AR) is already evolving into a valuable tool for travellers.

Like the iPhone, such AR apps know where users are, and beam location relevant info to their phones. This is viewed superimposed on the camera viewfinder on the mobile's screen.

London already has Tube help in this form, while others such as Layar can perform the neat trick with restaurants, mentioned earlier.

Japan

's version of this application, Sekai (World) camera, works the same magic, but adds tagging and social networking.

Like other AR apps it calculates your position, then using the camera, displays location-specific information graphically on top of your real-world view.

But the genius of Sekai Camera is that individuals and businesses can add their own information. They just point a smartphone camera at the landscape, adding "tags" that can include text, images, and sound that can be picked up by others in the area later.

Tags can translate into coupons from businesses (a free Guinness when you stop at a bar serving the black stuff, for example) or travel tips from friends.

Such apps are not just confined to Japan. They are available now at a smartphone near you.

But Japan still holds the lead with applications of tech for travel.

Overnight stay

The county's hotel industry is also benefiting from a dash of hi-tech gloss. Check into the entirely swish 9h (nine hours) capsule hotel in Kyoto and you might experience the teched-up future of budget hotels.

Ultra-futuristic, the Kubrick-inspired pods go for about 4000 yen a night via their website.

Kyoto might be rich in heritage but this doesn't stop it over-dosing like the rest of urban Japan on hi-tech treats. For evidence, visitors might want to check out the phone chargers available in even the most venerable temples.

The futuristic travel experience that 9h offers (perhaps a model for a Mars trip accommodation?) includes a pod, not a bedroom, with a "Sleep Ambient Control System", that "lulls to a comfortable sleep". The same system awakens guests with light, not an alarm clock.

Spartan, functional, but fun for a night.

For sci-fi visions of how we might travel smarter in the future Japan obviously has plenty to show us. But the West is catching up fast.

Smartphones such as the iPhone and their apps are changing the way we travel, and how the travel industry attracts and aids such tourists.

Where most, outside of Japan, are still adjusting to life seen through the prism of the mobile, in Japan it is now second nature.

These early adopters are worth watching just to see how the tech will usher in new services for getting about and how to capitalise on our new-found travel touchstone - the mobile.