Tax Professionals: You Need To Know… What You Do Not Know About Operating Your Business Online (Lesson I)

Tax Professionals: You Need To Know... What You Do Not Know (Lesson I)

You are a tax professional and just want to stay focused on business. You are now working in a world that has changed and much of it has been secret, yet right before your eyes. More than ever, important information is coming out about how you use the internet and you are likely wondering what you should or can believe. Since our inception, TaxConnections has operated differently from all the other sites you may be utilizing right now. We do not sell your data or information nor do we have an App that collects all your personal information. We focus on promoting your professional expertise to drive new clients to you. We run a platform that places a very high value respecting your privacy!

We want to educate our tax professional members about working online and will provide a series “You Need To Know… What You Do Not Know”. If you are working online, as we all are, it is your responsibility to learn a lot more than you may realize or be cognizant of working online. Please follow me in the weeks ahead to learn what you should know operating your business online.

Start by watching this video and making certain your family also watches this YouTube Video:

The Creepy Line

Everyone in the world should watch the above mentioned video!

Then pay attention to the lessons we send you as we offer a solution to our members. You will be a lot smarter operating online.

Lesson One: Apps – What To Consider

  1. The best way to keep your personal data private is to avoid Apps!
  2. When you consent to sharing your data with Apps, you are also allowing App Developers to collect your data and sell it to third parties.
  3. Data marketing firms convince developers to include trackers in their Apps. Companies offer App developers cash in exchange for a few lines of code called SDK or “software development kit” into their Apps that make it easy for developers to evade detection. Trackers are tucked away in the Apps codebase, and developers can share user outside data of their Apps by uploading your information into their private servers.
  4. According to Buzzfeed, “Most third-party services operate in the background and do not provide any visual cues inside the Apps, effectively tracking users without their knowledge or consent while remaining virtually invisible, “wrote researchers in a February 2018 Study. The collected data is virtually untraceable as it is passed from data broker to data broker to marketers to others.
  5. Because data collection for purposes of advertising is either disclosed in long-winded privacy policies or not at all; it is difficult to tell which Apps have trackers and which do not have trackers. Nearly all types of Apps include trackers.
  6. Companies like Facebook and Facebook-owned Instagram, as well as Googles suite of Apps including Gmail and YouTube collect a wealth of detailed user information on you.
  7. According to an article in Buzzfeed …In 2017, Yale Privacy Lab detected trackers in over 75% of the Android Apps analyzed. A March 2018 Study of 160,000 free Android Apps found that more than 55% of trackers tried to extract user location, while 30% accessed the device’s contact list. According to an article at CNET, “More than 1,000 Android Apps harvest data even after you deny permissions.
  8. Buzzfeed states what they learned from Teemo, a Paris-based marketing company, how developers are approached with pay-for-data schemes. Developers placed Teemo’s SDK into their App and Teemo pays $4 per thousand users per month. “If you have 1M active monthly users at $4 per thousand, you have $4,000 per month to your pockets.”
  9. According to cybersecurity firm Cairo, Apps that collect the most personal data from you tend to be ones where “You” are the focus. The top Apps collecting information on you include: Facebook, CVS Pharmacy, NHS Covid 19 Testing, Credit Karma, Instagram, Ebay, Deliveroo, Tesco, Uber, Spotify, Strava, Walmart, Amazon, Netflix, My Fitness Pal, Jet2, PayPal, Tinder, and more with Facebook being the biggest grabber of them all!
  10. Check your phone privacy settings to make certain your Apps are not collecting your personal information and data.

TaxConnections does not have an APP for good reasons!
Lesson To Learn: You have the opportunity to be on a platform that helps your business and never sells you out!

We believe there is a way to operate your business on the web without all your professional data being taken and sold.

Join TaxConnections

TaxConnections is where to find leading tax experts and technology around the world. Discover tax professionals who offer you a wide range of tax expertise and be more informed about the technology that supports them in operating efficiently and successfully.

TaxConnections connects tax professionals with new tax clients and tax jobs around the world. Tax Professional Members establish higher visibility online so prospective clients and employers can find our members easily. Each members also receives a Virtual Tax Office which is the most valuable online real estate available today! TaxConnections makes a difference in your professional life.

We offer a Special Membership rate to tax professionals out of work.
https://www.taxconnections.com/special-membership

Kat Jennings, CEO
TaxConnections
858.999.0053
kat@taxconnections.com

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