John Palfrey, author of "Born Digital" was interviewed about privacy concerns on “The Digital Age.” His research shows that the “Digital Natives” of the Millennial Generation are often not concerned about internet privacy – until it is too late.
He uses the analogy of getting a tattoo to describe the content that people put on the internet. Like a tattoo, people post content online in a moment when they have passion for it, without realizing that this is something they may not be able to get rid of later in life, even in they want to. Sort of a cyber-tattoo.
For instance, it is very simple for someone to take a picture with a Blackberry and instantly post the photo to their Facebook page. Once done, this picture may be picked up by any of their “friends” and posted elsewhere, perhaps distributed virally. One big difference, though, is that “friends” can’t force someone to get a real tattoo, but they can post content about someone else online, which may lead to a cyber-tattoo.
The reason this can happen so easily can be described with another analogy – it’s like people picking their noses in their cars. People perceive greater privacy online than they necessarily have. They perceive a certain level of privacy when posting online. They imagine an audience of a small group of friends. However, those friends have other friends, and friend-groups change and grow over time, so content becomes visible to more people than the user originally imagines.
It is not just young people who over-share online. The greatest risk-group are adults who use online dating sites. They share large amounts of very personal information about themselves on these sites.
On one side of the debate over online privacy are those who say – who cares? Maybe we just no longer prize privacy like we used to, and maybe it doesn’t really matter. Or, maybe it does matter and it is better to be more open and less private. Some who are anti-privacy regulations feel that sharing information fuels innovation.
However, others are very concerned about massive information sharing, and information storing. While they may be harmless in unconnected bits of data, many companies are now tying our information back together – linking our online and offline behaviors. When these bits are connected, they can show a large amount of information about us.
We know that companies want this information so that they can market to us well. However, other companies may use the information against us. For instance, insurance companies could raise our rates and credit companies could lower our scores based on assumptions made from our cyber-profiles. Check out this blog from choklatsoda - A New Type of Profiling
There is also the issue of true criminals. By allowing them to hold information about us, we are forced to “trust” these companies who are aggregating information about our lives. However, there are no regulations that they need to protect this information.
Who “owns” the information about us? Who should protect it?
Maybe there is another angle - Maybe people just don't realize/know that (1) their information is easy to find; (2) their information is being collected; (3) their information is hard to remove once it has been published.
ReplyDeleteOne example of my own ignorance was that I never really thought that my Google searches were being saved for 24 months (or less these days) on some server. I just thought the search phrases ended after I hit the "Search" button.