Privacy Information

Author and Page information

  • by Anup Shah
  • This page last updated

Some email viruses and spam are pretending to originate from globalissues.org when they do not. See below for more details.

Privacy is important to me, and I am sure for you. These are only scenarios where some data is collected on this site:

  1. When you volunteer to sign up for email updates
  2. When pages are visited, some standard usage data is recorded by the web server, allowing technical analysis of the site and to understand how it is functioning
  3. Third party advertising service uses cookies to tailor their advertising as needed

If there are any other means in the future, they will be described here. See below for more information.

On this page:

  1. Viruses and spam pretending to originate from Globalissues.org
  2. Privacy of email addresses
  3. Analysis of web usage uses anonymous data gathering
    1. Google Analytics service
  4. Cookies

Viruses and spam pretending to originate from Globalissues.org

Globalissues.org does not sell or pass on email addresses or use them for spam in any way.

Please be aware that there are numerous viruses and email harvesting robots spreading around the Internet that have the ability to mimic other people’s email addresses. I unfortunately understand that some of these viruses and spammers may have impersonated email addresses from globalissues.org when spreading a virus or sending emails, when it has not in fact originated from globalissues.org at all. They also have nothing to do with globalissues.org in any way.

I regret the situation, but am unable to do anything about it. For readers to contact me, I have had to put my email addresses on this web site, but I have tried to hide it in ways that automated software will hopefully not find my addresses and harvest them. Unfortunately these techniques are never guaranteed as spammers and viruses always grow in sophistication.

For more information, please see for example the following:

  • An article from CNet’s News.com1 from 2002, a web site devoted to technology news.
  • An article from the Boston Globe2 from 2006 that suggests spammers are going to get more sophisticated and harder to detect, unfortunately.

If you feel you have received email from me that appears to be spam or a virus, please do contact me3 for more information so we can try to resolve this if possible, or contact your anti-virus software vendor (or get some virus protection software soon!)

Back to top

Privacy of email addresses

This site provides the ability to send you a monthly email newsletter informing you of changes and updates to the site, and related matters. If you are interested, you can sign up to this site’s service4, which is free.

If you use this email update service, your privacy is simple: your email is the only bit of information needed, and is kept in strict confidence. Please see the previous link for further details.

If you are still unsure but would still like to stay in touch with the site, I also offer an alternative, an RSS Feed5. You can find out more about this option by following the previous link.

This site also provides the ability to share a page with others by providing theirs, and yours, email address. These are not stored, and only used for the purpose of sharing the page via email.

Back to top

Analysis of web usage uses anonymous data gathering

Almost all web servers provide the ability to record some information about the nature of a visit to a page. Typical information stored includes:

  • Date and time of the request made;
  • The page that was requested;
  • The IP address used to access the resource;
  • What referring web site did the visit come from;
  • Technical stuff like was the request successful or were there any errors, how long the page took to respond, etc.

I use this data to attempt to get a better understanding of how the site is functioning, what areas are popular, what needs improving, etc.

The web hosting company I use to host my web site provides me a service whereby they go through these log files and present pretty charts and graphs, making it easier for me. I can therefore know things like how many page views I get per day, week, month, year, etc. I can find out which pages are popular, and so on.

At no time is any personally identifiable information used to track you through your visit. I don’t have any area on the site where I ask you to identify yourself, so I cannot know anything about any individual user.

Note that while the IP address is stored, it is a standard configuration from my web hosting company, but it is generally hard to personally identify a user through an IP address as most IP addresses are often internet service provider proxy servers. I do not make use of the IP address, in any case.

Google Analytics service

I use a service from Google that can provide some richer analytics. It can help tell me what search terms people are using, gives a more accurate technical breakdown of what type of computer and web browser software readers are generally using, and so on.

To achieve this, Google requires I request a small piece of code on their servers each time a web page on my server is loaded. That code can then record this information. Again, it is all non-personally identifiable.

Google requires me to put their own privacy statement on my site for you to see:

This website uses Google Analytics, a web analytics service provided by Google, Inc. (Google). Google Analytics uses cookies, which are text files placed on your computer, to help the website analyze how users use the site. The information generated by the cookie about your use of the website (including your IP address) will be transmitted to and stored by Google on servers in the United States. Google will use this information for the purpose of evaluating your use of the website, compiling reports on website activity for website operators and providing other services relating to website activity and internet usage. Google may also transfer this information to third parties where required to do so by law, or where such third parties process the information on Google’s behalf. Google will not associate your IP address with any other data held by Google. You may refuse the use of cookies by selecting the appropriate settings on your browser, however please note that if you do this you may not be able to use the full functionality of this website. By using this website, you consent to the processing of data about you by Google in the manner and for the purposes set out above.

Google’s privacy policy regarding their analytics service.

I may choose to disable the Google Analytics service from time to time, as I am just evaluating it at the moment.

Back to top

Cookies

As mentioned above, Google Analytics needs to set some cookies which they can use to help create the richer analysis that helps me understand how the site is used.

In addition, I use Google Adsense to serve ads.

For more information on the Google services, and how to control the information sent to Google, please visit Google’s page, explaining how Google uses data6 from these services.

Finally, a cookie is used to store the fact you have consented to the use of cookies!

Other than that, I do not use a cookie for any purpose.

Back to top

0 articles on “Privacy Information”:

Author and Page Information

  • by Anup Shah
  • Created:
  • Last updated:

Back to top