If someone deletes their Skype account, it’s important to check to see if they have any messages or files left on the account. If so, it’s possible that they may have lost important data or communication with friends and family.
Does Google show you a user’s last login at the top of their profile page if they deleted their account (no longer showing information)? Nope. You have to do some digging on a public page that requires authentication first. That seems unlikely for most users since it is exactly like making someone dig through your trash before giving them directions to your house.
The same applies for Microsoft and Yahoo!. My guess is that other websites are just as bad or worse at protecting our privacy when we choose to delete an online account. While these websites should offer protection, they don’t. With that information in hand, it is time to start deleting more accounts.
We have seen the horrible trend of websites selling user data for profit moving into the social media realm with Facebook and Google+. Unfortunately, this isn’t a “target practice” exercise where we shoot at these types of sites with our consumer dollars by only using social media services that respect privacy. Instead, we need to be treating all websites like Bikini Beach:
The best way for individual consumers to protect their online privacy from companies and governments alike is through non-participation. The problem is that most people are not willing to take action right now because they don’t think they personally have anything to worry about (yet) or they think it’s too hard to live without these online services.
The good news is that there are plenty of low-cost or even free alternatives out there. I’ve used many of them over the years and can vouch for their usage across a wide spectrum of users and age groups. The bad news is that most people don’t use them, even when they know about them in advance because it’s much easier to stay on Facebook than fight against its allure (and privacy violations). There are too many ways we stop ourselves from taking action with this problem — technology addiction doesn’t come close.
When I dug up this information for Skype, it was an eye opener because Skype is cross-platform and now owned by Microsoft (who knows what they will do with your data). It’s time to explore other options and take control of your online privacy before we see another Facebook or Google+ experience for all platforms. In fact, there is an article on TheNextWeb about Microsoft planning on acquiring more companies in 2011 . Start thinking about which sites can be replaced with free
