Online Identity is a topic close to my heart. Passwords may be directly related to authentication — but Passpack’s relationship with Online Identity runs deeper than that.
Let me share with you our ultimate vision for Passpack: in our personal lives, we all have public and private spheres. The latter is completely missing in our virtual life. Passpack wants to give you back your privacy.
What Privacy Is
Privacy is the right to choose what to share, how much of it we want shared and with whom.
Privacy is not secretive. Privacy is not having something to hide. Privacy is not asocial.
Web 2.0, better known as – the social web, is based on a mass collective exchange of information – and one perfect example is lifestreaming.
Your online identity is diffused across various social networking platforms – by nature they are limited in privacy. This is by no means implying such platforms don’t follow privacy standards but applications like Facebook, Twitter, Myspace, FriendFeed are born specifically to share information beyond your ring of contacts.
But, sometimes we need to share things – like personal messages, health records and so much more and we need to share these things with particular people in complete confidentiality. Being able to do so… that is privacy. And it requires one key factor – Trust.
The Ring of Trust
Welcome to The Ring of Trust. It may not sound familiar, because it hasn’t existed until now.
Trust is that area that overlaps public and private. It’s pulling a select person or company into my private sphere long enough to entrust them (and only them) with something. I know that they will keep it confidential and will not share it with others. If they live up to my expectation, they may earn more excursions into my private sphere. Some people earn a permanent slot. But I decide.
As a professional, I need to share sensitive data with my colleagues and not wanting to send it to them by email (knowing they are just like online postcards), I would invite them into my Ring of Trust.
Privacy: Beyond a Concept
Passpack is and always will be an online password manager and now we will also take on the responsibility of being an online privacy manager as well. Privacy is not only made up of passwords, it’s made of people and powered by technology.
This technology is what we have called Shared Host-Proof Hosting*. It finally gives users the unique experience of securely exchanging personal information, adding the necessary private sphere to our (sometimes too) public identities.
I am sure that I am not the only one who has felt the essential need for a new concept of privacy. And now, we have an answer to fulfill just this need.
Let privacy evolve. Let’s start building our own Ring of Trust.
*US Patent Pending