The concerns over privacy have been widely and intently debated for quite sometime. But, here is a real life example:
A few days ago I was checking-in at a local venue (via foursquare) and I noticed that the Mayor had an interesting profile photo. So I took a look around his profile. Within just a few minutes of browsing his check-ins. I knew exactly where this person lives. That was easily determined because they have foolishly established their home as a venue. I confirmed that it was indeed his address by cross-referencing the address of the venue with a quick whitepages.com search. I also know that he has a pet, but even better, I know that it is a dog.
I also know that he likes Mexican food. He eats out a lot….all the time. He drinks an enormous amount of beer. His political views are far right. He is a Tea Party supporter. He owns guns, lots of handguns. And thinks that people that do not own guns are stupid. He is married.
I could go on, but my point has been proven. The first mistake that this guy made was marking his home. Now I could have figured out his life habits by mapping out his check-ins with date & time, and I would have found his home eventually. However having his home marked made this all a bit easier.
With very little extra work, I could have used all of this data to cause harm to this person, whether it be physical, financial, or other.
I think that foursquare needs to take a look into people submitting their homes as venues. Not only does this prove to be unsafe to the user, whether it is his home or not, it devalues the foursquare experience. A compromise of user safety should be a concern.
I use Foursquare to explore my world. I like to find restaurants, coffee shops, museums, arts galleries, and the like near me, and I enjoy finding that some places will even give me a free cup of coffee just for checking in via Foursquare.
Keep up the good work, Foursquare. But, remember that your users are not smart enough to protect themselves from themselves.
If you are reading this & don’t have a clue what Foursquare is, this should get you started.
