Privacy and Power

As the internet first became available in the early 1990’s, the world experienced a way to communicate and deliver information that has never been experienced before. People were now able to communicate across states, purchase products in different countries, and build multidimensional businesses in the process; however, as the internet started to grow and become ingrained in every facet of the modern world, adverse side effects began to arise due to the rapid growth of the World Wide Web (WWW). As the number of users and websites increased, the amount of data that was being produced grew exponentially. This exponential growth of individual user data drove companies to begin to collect and analyze that data to help predict consumer behavior and individual purchasing habits.

This information proved vital for corporations to help foster and grow their businesses. However, as more businesses began to solicit users for their personal information, third party companies began to surveill large online websites for more targeted and directed consumer information. This direct and targeted surveillance of everyday internet users is becoming a growing concern and ethical issue for the individuals who use the internet in their daily lives. This collection and distribution of consumer data and information show the need for privacy and regulation on data collection and distribution while engaging in online activities. The average daily consumer is, mostly, unaware that their personal information is being collected and used to create more targeted and direct recommendations towards them.

However, with the recent revelations of these third party phantom companies operating and collecting consumer data without consumers consent, there is a growing need for expanded regulation and increased scrutiny of third party data collectors and their large scale social media conglomerate counterparts. In order to more clearly understand the ethical and moral problems that are operating in the data collection industry, and the need for consumer privacy, individuals need to take a greater look into three theories that are ingrained into this issue: critical theory, culture theory, and systems theory.

Critical theory is concerned with the abuse of power in an organization and the ways in which individuals can liberate themselves from being dominated or oppressed. This theory is strong in understanding how these powerful companies hold power over their customers by collecting their individual data. Next, culture theory explains the culture and identities of an organization and how they operate within an environment. Culture theory takes a look at how large organizations create their own identities and how they manage their organization, especially in the social media and technology industries. Lastly, systems theory looks at the communication within an organization and how the system of ordering helps determine the success of the organization. Systems theory is prominent in the social media and technology sector through how they disseminate information between the user and the company.

Critical Theory is concerned with the abuse of power and work on ways in which to eliminate oppressive practices within large organizations. This is very prevalent in today’s large scale data collection industry, particularly with individual user data. Critical theorists believe that organizations or corporations are tools that are used for the abuse and domination of a certain group or demographic set of individuals, and they try and devise ways in which to liberate people from these oppressive ways. With third party companies quietly and effectively collecting users information, the erosion of consumer and privacy and transparency is beginning to diminish on the internet. However, with large scale corporations producing billions of gigabytes of information, third party collection companies are trying to profit off the personal information that these companies sell to third party vendors.

The Hegemony of Third Party Data Collecting

With third party companies quietly collecting users personal data through various inconspicuous ways, consumers are beginning to realise the threat data collection has on the average daily internet user: “However, although companies value opportunities provided by the availability of large data sets, customers are wary as these analyses require the collection and storage of large amounts of personal or transactional customer data. This can be a threat to a consumer’s privacy” (Niemann). With these corporations generating large data sets of their customers personal information, it is becoming more prevalent the harm that can be done if personal user data is used in the wrong manner. For example, a third party company inserts itself into large social media sites such as Facebook, Instagram, and Twitter to collect data ranging from what you read, what you look at, what you enjoy in your spare time, and uses this information to create and identity about the individual it is tracking. This is particularly dangerous because these tracking features can quickly escalate into highly targeted surveillance weapons that are capable of creating a digital profile of any user who browses the internet.

Example 2: Manufactured Consent

Another way third party companies abuse your information, is through the means of online advertisements. The threat this incurs on users includes the presence of bias and incorrect information. As a result, these third party companies may be weaponized by those who wish to sway people’s opinions or garner support. This abuse of power may be seen on most areas of the internet, but social media is usually the most prevalent.

For example, advertisements that portray an issue from the point of view of a political group may appear on a user’s Facebook timeline. Although the advertisement may fit into their political ideology, bias or fallacy may be present to attempt to get the user to interact with the ad. The user being targeted may only receive information that falls into their political ideologies, meaning that they will not receive information on an issue from another political standpoint and will suffer from political bias. Sometimes this occurs to a greater extent, where fallacies are used as a means to gain political leverage (Scheiber & Isaac 2019). This issue will then benefit whoever paid for the advertisement and will adversely affect the user who is on the receiving end of the information.

Example 3:

Example 1: Behind the curve

Lawmakers at all levels are far behind the curve when it comes to making laws and protecting their constituents. Because technology is moving so fast, a new phone comes out every year and new laptop on the same schedule. Upgrades are coming out so fast it makes it near impossible to keep up with it. Lawmakers themselves whether in the senate or in a state senate are not full time tech people they. The US Senate has an average age of around 58 years. The people we have elected to represent us are so underprepared to face the growing issue of data privacy because they did not grow up with technology. Most probably did not use a computer until well into adulthood by then the damage was done. They do not have a knowledge base in computers, data, privacy concerns because it was never something they had to worry about. This was made apparently clear when a senate special committee was convened to interrogate Mark Zuckerburg on the data policies of Facebook. The questions asked showed such a low level understanding of computers data, how data is generated and what is considered data. For example from my own experience in computer classes. If you spend more than a certain amount of time on a picture or video. Your account is flagged and the tags related to that video and put into your profile and in the future you should expect to see more of the same type of content because you have shown an unconscious interest in it. If you have facebook downloaded unless you have manually turned off the permissions the app has almost full viewing permissions into your phone. It can see anything that is not hidden behind an encrypted folder. It can take the data whether it is photos, contacts, texts, or anything they need to build your “social” profile. The very people we elected to safeguard our right do not understand the level of data collection and violation of privacy that is happening everyday. Because they are older and did not grow up with the concerns we are facing today they are unprepared to proper;y take action against them.

Example 2: Our data is not our data

If you ever read into the terms and conditions of any app product or service chances are when it comes to the use of and storage or your data you will have no say in it. Some of the biggest companies reserve the right to collect sell and profit off of the data you produce. It is 100% profit for them. That is how if you ever google search a product you will within a few hours maybe a day or two you will start to get advertisements for the very thing you searched for. Maybe you have noticed advertisements for things you have only talked about or not even searched that is because apps on your phone has the permissions to turn on your phone microphone and record conversations. All because you consented to it in the terms and conditions. These companies have created this culture where they prey on us because they know they can get away with this sketchy behavior and once we agree to that terms and conditions is when any data we produce is theirs. This example ties into the first one under culture because we have elected senators and representatives who are fundamentally incapable of understanding technology on the level necessary to enact laws needed to protect our privacy. We have to fight these companies the hard way through choosing their competitors who do not use our data for their own profit. This process is slow and work intensive on our part but necessary to safeguard our privacy and right that these companies care nothing about.

Example 3:

Example 1:

Niemann, Antje, and Manfred Schwaiger. “Consumers Expectations of Fair Data Collection and Usage -- A Mixed Method Analysis.” 2016 49th Hawaii International Conference on System Sciences (HICSS), 2016, doi:10.1109/hicss.2016.456.

Outline for Group Project - Privacy and Power