PeopleMatter said it has raised $14 million in a Series C funding, which was led by Morgenthaler Ventures.

The Charleston, S.C.-based software company, which focuses on hourly workers, said the new investment will be used for product innovation and customer-acquisition strategies.

Existing investors Noro-Moseley Partners, C&B Capital, Intersouth Partners and Harbert Ventures also participated in the round. PeopleMatter had previously raised $14.4 million, which brings its total funding to just over $28 million.

PeopleMatter competes with other online talent management firms, such as SuccessFactors, Taleo and Rypple, although those focus on career professionals. In contrast, PeopleMatter is aimed at service-industry workers, including food service, convenience store, hospitality and retail verticals.

The company’s offering allows organizations to manage applicant tracking, hiring, onboarding, training and scheduling processes. It is also launching a smartphone app this week that workers can use.

More than 60 percent of social media users said last year that they deleted people from their friends lists, up from 56 percent in 2009; and 26 percent of users who keep their profiles private say they apply additional privacy settings to limit what some friends can see.

Profile “pruning” — deleting comments friends leave and untagging photos — is also on the rise, the report says.

Women are significantly more likely to keep their profiles private, and are more likely to unfriend people than men are, with 67 percent of women saying they’ve removed friends, compared with 58 percent of men. Young people are more likely to manage their social media presences by deleting comments and untagging photos.

Some 48 percent of social media users say they experience some level of difficulty managing privacy controls on their profiles — but 49 percent say the process is “not difficult” at all. A tiny sample of those surveyed say it’s “very difficult.”

The report highlights a divide between those who may care about privacy when it comes to social networks and those who seemingly do not. As Pew notes, it could be interpreted that avid users of social networks, who share lots of personal details, have abandoned any expectations of privacy, or are “uniquely unconcerned” about online privacy.

On the other side, Pew says, privacy advocates say the public still “cares deeply about their privacy online but those sensitivities have been ill-served by technology companies.”

The report comes just as the White House has moved to create a privacy bill of rights, aimed at governing online data tracking. One of the issues at hand is a “do not track” tool which Web companies like Google have just agreed to support. Last week, Google was reported to be using deceptive practices to track Web users in certain browsers.

As The Wall Street Journal notes, though, a “do not track” button would allow for some Web data collection — such as the data gathered through Facebook’s “Like” button.

Pew is careful not to point to Facebook directly throughout the report, but notes that Facebook is by far the most popular U.S. social network (in its recent S-1 filing, Facebook showed that its user base has ballooned to more than 845 million). Pew’s report says that the term “privacy settings” — as well as “unfriend” — are part and parcel of the Facebook experience.

The Pew survey on Internet usages was conducted between April and May of last year, and sampled more than 2,200 U.S. adults 18 and older. The survey found that two-thirds of U.S. Internet users had profiles on social networking sites, up from just 20 percent in 2006.

In terms of who was more likely to post things on social networks that they later admitted they regretted, males were almost twice as likely to do so, with 15 percent copping to it, than were females, at 8 percent. Young adults, age 18 to 29, were also more likely to post content that they’d later regret on social networks.

(Photo courtesy of Flickr/Oli Dunkley)

The reversal is being announced as part of the White House’s call for Congress to pass a “privacy bill of rights,” that will give people greater control over the personal data collected about them.

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A new Nike+ “pressure sensor” is coming to Nike basketball and training shoes. The sensors will track data about wearers’ movements and transmit it wirelessly to their iPhones. The enhanced basketball shoes are meant to track the movements of players during practice sessions and games, including (but not limited to) how high the wearers jump. The training shoes are meant for casual and competitive athletes involved in any intense fitness activity.

Nike has been adding sensors to its athletic gear since 2006, though some of the products send data to an iPod or accompanying fitness watch rather than to a smartphone. The company says the Nike+ community has grown to more than six million “digitally connected” athletes.

Last month, Nike introduced the Nike+ FuelBand, a lightweight rubber wristband meant to be worn all the time to track fitness levels, which are measured in a Nike-branded activity currency called NikeFuel.

With these new basketball and training shoes, Nike says, workout statistics can be shared with friends on social networks. They also offer a “showcase” mode, which allows wearers to superimpose their live data onto a video that can then be shared with friends. So now, when a heated debate arises about who jumped higher on the court, you can take it inside, to Facebook.

A couple of unanswered questions — which I’ll ask Nike in a short while, and update as needed — is whether the sensor uses Bluetooth or another kind of wireless technology to transmit the data, as well as how far the reach of the sensor is. Most casual basketball players I know wouldn’t want to carry their smartphones in their pockets while playing (and I’m imagining it’s the same case with pro players). So would the user have to head to the sidelines or locker room and be within a certain proximity of his or her phone to transmit the data? Or does the data sync automatically?

And I’m curious to hear more about how verticals are actually measured. For example, if one foot edges higher than another, is the ultimate measurement an average of the two verticals? Or is it from the foot that got higher?

The company’s first sensor-enabled basketball shoe will be the Nike Hyperdunk+, which will cost $250 and hit stores this June. The first training shoes that work on the Nike+ system will be the Lunar Hyper Workout+ for women and the Lunar TR 1+ for men.

Nike has said LeBron James will wear the Nike Hyperdunk+ shoes this summer at the London Olympics.

Update: Nike’s vice president of digital sport, Stefan Olander, offered some more details on how the new pressure sensor works.

It reads four key pressure points in the foot to track when the feet leave the ground, Olander said. That data is combined with accelerometer technology to measure gravity and overall movement.

While data transmission in the “old” Nike+ sensors and running sneakers is enabled through Nike’s proprietary radio protocol, the latest Nike+ sensors use a new kind of Bluetooth technology that is said to be faster — and saps less power from connected devices. The data is stored locally on the sensor, and users can (wirelessly) upload the data to their iPhones when they’re done with their basketball or training session.

Also, the new pressure sensors are put into both left and right sneakers — unlike earlier versions of Nike+ sensors, which slipped into just one shoe — to more accurately measure the wearer’s movements. Whether the user takes off from the left foot or right foot — for example, when shooting a layup or attempting to dunk — Nike knows the timing of the foot pressure; the company claims it has created an algorithm that is more than 96 percent accurate in measuring jumps.

I wasn’t at today’s press event, but here are some tweets from those who were, including, naturally, Nike:

Improve every time you step on the court or in the gym. Introducing Nike+ Basketball & Nike+ Training #innovate http://t.co/7dsnBBwq

February 22, 2012 8:23 am via Nike PublisherReplyRetweetFavorite

@Nike

Nike

Nike has just unveiled a Hyperdunk shoe with a pressure sensor that tracks every move & allows you to upload it.

February 22, 2012 8:21 am via Twitter for iPhoneReplyRetweetFavorite

@darrenrovell

darren rovell

#Nike is arguing that it will bring the power of its own lab to any athlete through technology. I like the idea of the connected athlete.

February 22, 2012 8:18 am via Twitter for iPadReplyRetweetFavorite

@jeffjarvis

Jeff Jarvis

Nike+ will tell you how high you jumped when you okay bball!!! That’s unreal!!

February 22, 2012 8:23 am via Twitter for iPhoneReplyRetweetFavorite

@omid

Omid Ashtari

Here’s a promotional YouTube video featuring Mr. James himself, showing off the sneakers and how another player’s vertical data is transmitted to the iPhone:

The lawmakers — Edward J. Markey (D., Mass.), Joe Barton (R., Texas) and Cliff Stearns (R., Fla.) 00 want to know if Google’s behavior “constitutes a violation” of a privacy settlement Google and the Federal Trade Commission signed last year. Breaches of the settlement could bring fines of as much as $16,000 per violation per day.

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Apple says it is working to put a stop to the practice. And Google, which had been tracking users after exploiting this loophole to put Google +1 buttons in ads, stopped the practice after being contacted by The Wall Street Journal.

But in the meantime, to stop such tracking by other advertising companies, the only options available to Safari users are problematic.

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The companies used special computer code that tricks Apple’s Safari Web-browsing software into letting them monitor many users. Safari, the most widely used browser on mobile devices, is designed to block such tracking by default.

Google disabled its code after being contacted by The Wall Street Journal.

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Massachusetts Democrat Ed Markey said on Monday that he had drafted a bill requiring device makers and others to inform consumers of what software is installed or added to their phones.

The move comes after last year’s uproar surrounding Carrier IQ software installed on various devices on behalf of cellular providers.

“Consumers have the right to know and to say no to the presence of software on their mobile devices that can collect and transmit their personal and sensitive information,” Markey said in a statement.

A number of carriers and device makers have backed away from supporting or using Carrier IQ, including Apple and Sprint. Carrier IQ has also defended its practices.

As drafted, the bill would require consumers to be notified when they buy a device about what monitoring software is installed; and to be told if the device maker, carrier or operating-system provider later installs such software, or if a downloaded app also includes tracking software.

Consumers would be told what type of information is collected, how it will be used and to whom it is provided. Cellphone owners would have to give consent, and any parties getting the information would be required to have policies in place to protect the information.

I’ve sent notes to the major carriers, device makers and mobile operating system vendors to see if they have anything to say about the new bill. A representative of the CTIA, a cellphone industry trade association, said the group had no position or comment.

The GPS shoes have a tracking device implanted in the right sole, with a GSM/CDMA antenna snaking up behind the heel so that the GPS signal is not blocked by the body; the shoe also includes a USB port, primarily for charging the product’s battery.

Made by footwear company Aetrex, with GPS technology provided by GTX Corp., the shoes cost $299.99, with the added monthly cost of a tracking plan. Caretakers can opt to have the wearer’s location recorded every 10 minutes for $39.99 a month, or every 30 minutes for $35.99 a month.

Customers can visit the Aetrex Web site to purchase the shoes, set up an account for the shoes through GTX Corp. and, using Google Maps, create a “geo-fence” encompassing what’s considered a safe distance around a wearer’s house or living community. The caretaker can opt to have messages sent via email or receive simple SMS text messages on a cellphone when the wearer wanders outside of the geo-fence.

The caretaker can then access the online portal to find the wearer’s location on a Google Map. There’s also an emergency backup system the caretaker can call for additional help; that requires the caretaker to share the GPS information with the emergency-care provider.

Aetrex began planning and designing the GPS shoes two years ago; the product was certified by the Federal Communications Commission in September of last year and began shipping in late December. Only a few hundred pairs have sold so far, but Aetrex president Evan Schwartz said the companies have done little marketing at this point, and have been focused instead on a strategic rollout of the shoes.

Schwartz also said the company will begin shipping to Canada and other countries soon, and that Aetrex and GTX have struck a deal with an international SIM card provider to make the tech available internationally.

For now, Aetrex and GTX are selling the shoes directly to consumers, but they have been in talks with the Alzheimer’s Association and the Veterans Benefits Association to explore partnerships for marketing the shoes to assisted-living communities and geriatrics departments.

While the GPS shoes could give caregivers some peace of mind if a family member is prone to wandering, the concept of trackable clothing could raise questions from both a technical and legal standpoint.

Aetrex says the battery life of the shoes lasts two days on average, but the shoes would be rendered ineffective if a caretaker wasn’t around to charge them, or the wearer forgot to do so. Also, if the person monitoring the shoe-wearer opts in for more frequent pings, the battery will die more quickly. Aetrex says the GPS shoe system does send email or text notifications to remind the caretaker when the battery is getting low.

There’s also the possibility, of course, that the wearer could remove the shoes, or simply refuse to wear them.

When someone purchases the GPS shoes and goes to activate the online monitoring system, he or she has to sign off that they are a designated caregiver, and that they have the authority to monitor the wearer of the shoes and make those kinds of decisions for the wearer. But, as with many of the technologies we have at our fingertips, there is always the possibility of misuse.

A recent Supreme Court case involving law enforcement officials’ use of GPS to track a drug-trafficking suspect has also raised some questions about the rights civilians have when it comes tracking others using GPS technology (our Wall Street Journal/SmartMoney colleagues did a good rundown of some instances where it can be done legally). Stories like these indicate that we’re still in the early stages of setting privacy standards when it comes to digital tracking.

“It’s all kinds of good and bad and ugly popping up when it comes to GPS tech these days, and that’s definitely a concern,” Schwartz said. “There are enough people who make jokes about tracking a spouse, or what if you threw the shoe in the trunk of someone’s car and they never know it’s being used for that, that sort of thing.”

“But at the same time,” he added, “this shoe has been designed to serve a purpose, and it’s to help caregivers, so we have a hard time believing someone would abuse this.”

Correction: An earlier version of this article said the GPA shoes support CDMA technology. The shoes do not support CDMA; the antennae in the shoes are GSM/GPS.

Andy Smith, CEO of IAC-owned DailyBurn, says that the benefit of fitness-tracking tools goes away after the first few weeks, and users ultimately fall into the same activity — or inactivity — patterns as before.

“They do help a small subset of people,” Smith said. “You find that there are type-A personalities that like to track everything, and that’s great. For others, it might give them a little jump start. But the value proposition of those devices after the first few weeks goes way down.”

DailyBurn is a fitness-data-tracking company that is now focusing on fitness content. The company pivoted partly because data-tracking wasn’t all that effective, Smith said.

Last week, Nike introduced a $150 lightweight wristband with a tri-axis accelerometer for gauging activity levels; earlier this week, Fitbit — maker of the popular Fitbit device — announced that it had raised $12 million in Series C funding to continue making fitness products.

Nike’s FuelBand just became available for preorder, so it’s too early to tell how enthusiastic consumers are about that particular device. And while it’s unclear how many Fitbit units have sold since it hit the market in 2009, the newer Fitbit Ultra is listed as one of the top 50 products in the health-and-fitness section on Amazon.com.

Another wearable fitness device, the Jawbone UP, is currently in production limbo as the company deals with technical and hardware issues, but the wristband was initially received with excitement from some consumers.

“I feel like these are not quite a gimmick, but are close to it,” Smith told AllThingsD. “You get people to spend $100 to $150 bucks on something that’s just a glorified accelerometer — which, by the way, you have in your phone, too.”

“I think people know when they’re not active,” Smith added. “They know if they didn’t move around enough today. I don’t buy it.”

Smith’s opinion is informed by the fact that DailyBurn used to be more data-oriented, but has since shifted its strategy become more content-focused, he said.

DailyBurn first launched in 2008 under the name Gyminee. Back then, the company was tailored more toward fitness data tracking and the sharing of data through social networks to help users meet their weight loss goals.

In May 2010, the company was acquired by IAC. At the time, the company claimed 500,000 members; Smith said it has around two million users now.

Following the acquisition, DailyBurn introduced the DailyBurn Tracker app, as well as food-tracking app Meal Snap, an attempt to spur weight loss motivation by giving caloric estimates based on photos of food.

Ultimately, Smith said, constant tracking isn’t necessarily the best way to facilitate that.

With DailyBurn’s newest fitness product — a personalized Web video program that streams over smartphones and the iPad to users’ TV sets — the company is focused on getting people to exercise four to six times a week, for 30 minutes a day, at a good level of intensity. It’s not something you buy that’s a quick fix, Smith said.

Readers, what are your thoughts? Are health-and-fitness tracking devices useful or useless?

It’s not entirely clear how the company will use the information. But it could mean that when users search via Google, the company will use their activities on sister sites like Gmail and YouTube to influence those users’ search results. Google hasn’t done that before.

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For more than a year, federal prosecutors have argued in U.S. District Court that the use of the stingray device — which can locate a mobile phone even when it’s not being used to make a call — wasn’t a search, in part because the user had no reasonable expectation of privacy while using Verizon Wireless cellphone service. Under that argument, authorities wouldn’t need to obtain a search warrant before using one of the devices.

The defendant in the case, Daniel David Rigmaiden, is facing fraud charges. His quest to force the government to provide information about the device used to locate him was the subject of front-page article in The Wall Street Journal in September.

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In July, the largest daily deals company sent an email to subscribers, saying it was changing the way it would use mobile location information. The same month, a congressman wrote to Groupon CEO Andrew Mason asking for more information regarding its data collection techniques, Reuters reports.

At the time, Groupon explained to users: “If you use a Groupon mobile app and you allow sharing through your device, Groupon may collect geo-location information from the device and use it for marketing deals to you.”

AllThingsD’s Kara Swisher wrote at the time: “In other words, if you let them, in order to improve the experience and make the Groupon app more useful, you’re being tracked.”

This was about the same time that Apple and Google got into hot water for tracking users on the phone, ostensibly in order to improve location-based services.

Groupon has become accountable for its actions not only because of the size of its business but also because of its announced intention to raise $750 million in a public offering.

In a response to the congressional questions, Groupon’s general counsel David Schellhase explained that the company is developing technology that will track customers’ locations, even if they don’t have the Groupon app open on their phones.

The letter was written to the co-chairmen of the House Bipartisan Privacy Caucus — Joe Barton, a Texas Republican, and Edward Markey, a Massachusetts Democrat — who made it publicly available today, according to Reuters.

Today, Groupon offers a service called Now that offers deals — based on a user’s location — that can be redeemed immediately. But in order to find the offers, you have to remember to open the app and search for discounts manually.

Schellhase argued in the letter that customers are asking for services, such as push notifications, that would make the process more automatic.

In the letter, Schellhase explained that if it were able to track a user’s location at all times, Groupon could send a notification to the phone that would appear around lunchtime and alert that person to an offer for a nearby restaurant.

“In order to choose a relevant deal for the user at the correct time, location information would need to be collected about the user just before noon, even if the Groupon mobile application is not running on the device at that time,” he explained.

Schellhase added that customers would have to sign up for the service, otherwise Groupon would not collect the data.

The new techniques, which are legal, reach beyond the traditional “cookie,” a small file that Web sites routinely install on users’ computers to help track their activities online. Hulu and MSN were installing files known as “supercookies,” which are capable of re-creating users’ profiles after people deleted regular cookies, according to researchers at Stanford University and University of California at Berkeley.

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While there has been a report on a boxing news site that Yahoo Americas head Ross Levinsohn was leaving the Internet giant to run HBO’s sports unit, it’s not so.

Trust BoomTown on this one–I have all top Yahoo execs embedded with Apple iOS and Google Android location tracking devices.

Apparently, calling to ask about such a big move is tough one-two for BoxingScene.com, but Yahoo confirmed the non-departure and Levinsohn did too in a brief phone conversation.

“I’m not leaving,” he said.

The Apple iOS and Google Android smartphone location-tracking kerfuffle. Smarty-pants commentators. KQED’s “Forum” radio show with interviewer Michael Krasny yesterday.

Go!

Madigan said in a statement that she had sent a letter to both companies asking them to detail exactly what information their devices are collecting, how long the information is stored and for what purposes.

“I want to know whether consumers have been informed of what is being tracked and stored by Apple and Google and whether those tracking and storage features can be disabled,” Madigan said in a statement. “It’s important that these companies ensure that their users’ private information is protected.”

Madigan is among the latest to raise questions over how the companies are dealing with location-based information following articles last week noting that, since the release of iOS 4, Apple devices have been keeping a detailed database of everywhere that iPhones and 3G-equipped iPads have been, storing the information in an unencrypted file.

The Wall Street Journal also noted that certain location-based information is also being sent to Apple and Google from their devices. In a separate story on Sunday night, the Journal noted that the iPhone appears to be storing the data whether or not users opt in to location-based services.

According to Bloomberg, the South Korean government is also looking into Apple’s data practices, and the first consumer lawsuits have appeared, filed in Florida.

Apple has declined to comment on its practices, including how much information is sent to the company, how long it is kept, how it is used and why the information is stored in an unencrypted file. However, its CEO reportedly responded to one customer’s mail with a terse comment. “We don’t track anyone. The info circulating around is false,” Jobs said in the email, as reported by MacRumors. Apple has declined to say whether the email is indeed from Jobs, though he is known to fire off short responses on occasion to customers who email him.

Google declined comment on Madigan’s letter, but defended its practices last week, noting that it collects information only from users who opt to receive location-based services such as custom search and mapping. The company has said the information collected is tied to a unique identifier that is specific to each Android device, but is not tied to other personal information, such as a Google ID.

“Our view is that that’s an industry discussion,” Erich Andersen, deputy general counsel for Microsoft, told Digits. “We’re trying to take a leadership role in helping users send a signal of their intention. But the key thing is that a definition of ‘tracking’ needs to happen.” Microsoft Advertising serves ads based on users’ browsing behavior as well as on Bing searches and sites like MSN.

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Lawrence E. Strickling, an assistant secretary of commerce, is expected to call for the legislation at a hearing of the Senate Commerce Committee, said a person familiar with the matter.

This person said the administration will back a law that follows the outlines of a report issued by the Commerce Department in December. The administration wants any new rules to be enforceable and will look to expand the Federal Trade Commission’s authority, this person said.

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Microsoft’s decision to include the tool in Internet Explorer 9 means Google Inc. and Apple Inc. are the only big providers of browsers that haven’t yet declared their support for a do-no-track system in their products. In January, Mozilla Corp. said it would include a do-not-track feature in an upcoming version of its Firefox browser. Internet Explorer is the most widely used browser.

The moves by Microsoft and Mozilla reflect an unusually fast adoption of an idea—the do-not-track system—that was first officially proposed by the Federal Trade Commission only three months ago. It highlights the pressure the industry faces to provide people with a way to control how they are tracked and targeted online, as lawmakers and regulators threaten to rein in the practice.

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