OLR: Exercise 3 – Topic 6

Trust online seems to be something that happens in general alot more easily then in the real world. Daily we hear about people having their information phished from various sites and emails. With this in mind what is a way to foster and build trust in the online world. There are a number of things that I look for when trusting a site.

These include: Who owns the site? e.g. A large company like Google or Microsoft.

What is their reputation like? have I heard about this site from other sources both external organisations or through word of mouth within various communities.

What does the site believe in? Do they have systems in place to protect users and their information?

With these in mind its important that sites build up their reputation. For example I first logged into a site called curse.com which I discovered through word of mouth of the community. The site has grown expenentially since I first discovered it. The site offers files for download for the Game World of warcraft and over the years has done a number of things to build trust within the community. They have implimented virus scanning to prevent the uploading of viruses. They have also modified their advertising to move away from unethical advertising e.g. Real money transfer sites. In addition to this they have complied with the standards of Blizzard Entertainment to gain status in the official fansite program.

Another site is Facebook. I have heard of this site talked about alot in the mainstream media positivily which has given me the impression that the site is legitimate. In addition to this I was refered to the site through some good friends which also gave me someone I knew providing a word of mouth recomendation to the site.