Privacy

What would the Founding Fathers think of Facebook? Great question. We keep referring almost everything back to the Fathers - so it makes sense to wonder what they'd think of social media. You can just see it: (Madison: "Well, there goes the right to privacy. " Jefferson: "This is so cool !") This question - which opens into a bigger one, about the fate of personal privacy in the communications age - is the topic Thursday at 6:30 p.m. at the National Constitution Center.

As I'm reminded whenever I travel, the era of smartphones, websites, and cloud computing has brought wondrous advances to my life. If I get lost, I can create an instant map, activate a GPS app on my iPhone, or call the person or business I'm trying to find. I can access my e-mail constantly - OK, not every advance is so wondrous. And I can get my personal data wherever I roam, whether around town, across the country, or overseas. Is there any danger to all that access? Yes, according to Digital Due Process, a broad coalition of technology firms, privacy experts, and advocacy groups focusing on a problem most of us would likely rather ignore: the fact that if you and I can get all that information anywhere and anytime, so can the most intrusive government investigators.

I am locked in a battle with Google for control of my cellphone, and Google is winning. If you have an Android device (Google's smartphone), it may recently have installed a new app from Google called "Latitude. " It was part of a system update, so I didn't pay any attention when it showed up. But one night, I got an e-mail from Google saying that Latitude was running and reporting my location. The notification was written to be ignored: E-mail from Google usually says it's from Google.

Facebook knows your likes and dislikes, not to mention who your friends are. Amazon knows your taste in books and anything else you shop for at its online superstore. Google knows what you research or wonder about. And other websites - including this one, if you're reading at Philly.com - can track your browsing and clicking habits as you navigate from site to site in the same ad networks. But what does your wireless carrier or Internet provider know about you? Potentially, all those same things and much, much more - which is why changes in Verizon and Verizon Wireless' data policies are stirring concern among privacy advocates and members of Congress.

Are you concerned about your privacy with so many security cameras and people toting phone cameras everywhere?

By Felice J. Freyer, Paul E. Jarris, and Robert M. Pestronk In the recently released movie Contagion , a deadly flu virus originating in bats and pigs spreads to humans worldwide, killing millions and causing chaos. Moving as fast as the virus is misinformation; one character observes that the falsehoods of a self-serving blogger are as dangerous as the virus itself. Public-health officials strive to release the right information at the right time, but they struggle to counter the irresponsible blogger.

FAMILY WHEEL LIFE Kids like cars. Kids like trucks. Kids like bikes, buses, motorcycles, trains and trolleys. This is the ingeniously simple premise of Everything Goes on Land , the first book Roxborough illustrator Brian Biggs has written, too. Inspired by his own childhood love of Matchbox cars, informed by his neighborhood mechanic, the gleeful work is "Where's Waldo" meets Richard Scarry, minus Waldo's loneliness in a sea of...

Extremely Public Displays of Privacy. At long last, we reach Act 3 of New Paradise Laboratories' 2011 Live Arts project, in which we followed the entanglement between 40-something Fess Elliot (Annie Enneking) - wife, mother, lapsed musician - and 20-something Internet sylph Beatrix Luff (Brittany Freece, voiced by Mary Tuomanen) from chance online meeting through seven podcasts featuring an exhibitionist's walking tour of Rittenhouse Square, to the corner of 17th and Sansom Streets, where we are ushered to an undisclosed location where, presumably, all will be revealed.

NEWARK, N.J. - Newark Liberty International Airport has become the first New York-area airport to install body-scanning technology that will replace a system harshly criticized for invading travelers' privacy by displaying naked images. Transportation Security Administration officials unveiled the software Friday at the airport, where more than eight million passengers boarded planes last year. The technology was originally tested in February at Atlanta, Las Vegas, and Washington, and was rolled out in July.