With the recent noise around SA's Protection of Personal Information Act - which was signed into law by president Jacob Zuma over a year-and-a-half ago - information privacy has taken centre stage.
The International Association of Privacy Professionals defines information privacy as the right to have some control over how personal information is collected and used.
Recently, international security researchers released a report detailing how (in particular) Android users' information is shared with advertising and tracking agencies - something that, by being more privacy savvy, users can avoid.
Maiendra Moodley, divisional head for financial systems and processes at the State Information Technology Agency (SITA), outlines five guidelines for safeguarding privacy - whether in a personal or business capacity - when a company or individual is a part of the World Wide Web.
1. Be wary of what private information you disclose on social media sites. Invariably, information disclosed on social media sites can allow a malicious individual or criminal to profile a target. Through the use of this profiling, it would be possible to commit crimes such as identity theft.
2. Understand the use of the information you are asked to supply before providing any details. Often, for identification purposes, people may be asked to supply certain information. Make a concerted attempted to understand how this information will be stored, protected and any terms of potential disclosure.
3. Make business-aware privacy choices. When shopping online or browsing Web sites, look at companies' privacy policies to understand whether your online behaviour will be tracked.
4. Choose strong encryption for documents which may be stored either on hard drives or online. In respect of the latter, the desire for convenient access often forces users to upload first, and think about security and privacy later.
5. Before posting anything online relating to someone else, consider carefully how this would impact on their privacy. There is often a fair amount of personal information inadvertently disclosed on social media sites, without the individual's own explicit upfront consent.
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