People are becoming more and more apathetic to how their data is being collected and used, and I find that disturbing. With every addition to the tracking and sale of their data they act like it doesn’t matter; “what would they use my data for?”
What they would use your data for Link to heading
Contrary to popular belief, your data matters to advertising companies like Google and Meta. Everything they do has gone far beyond just “advertising”, making that word too mild for our use case.
Adverts used to be a simple way of convincing people to buy your product, which is very reasonable. They weren’t anything like the modern ones. They weren’t targeted to a specific group of people or used to manipulate elections (see German, Romanian and American elections). Meta used their algorithms to spread hate and assist in the genocide of the Rohingya in Myanmar. The ludicrous amount of data they have enabled them to manipulate with hundreds of thousands of people, because the more data they have on a person the easier it is for them to do so.
A technique they used is to create echo chambers where people pat each other on the back about how great it is to murder Rohingyan people. Those in echo chambers continue to spiral down into this horrible idea, taking others with them.
It may seem like this is unprofitable for Meta, but that is not the case. Meta makes money when people stay longer on their platform, producing ad revenue. And what causes the best user retention? Anger. Meta’s incentive is to make people angry, because that’s what keeps users on the platform. The best way to prevent that is to simply stop using their platforms. Don’t give them your data! Not using products of “advertising” companies also has a practical advantage, it saves you a lot of time. You won’t have to sit through ads (even if you do keep using their platforms, please protect your privacy by switching to Firefox and installing uBlock Origin, or you can use Brave), waste time scrolling through pointless content or fuel your hate, a universally unpleasant emotion. Your time is worth a lot more to you than it is to advertising companies.
Data in tyranny Link to heading
It’s not just that data can be used to cause genocide, it could put you in prison, or worse. Imagine the following: you are an American, and a year ago you sent someone a message via WhatsApp opposing Donald Trump. Trump and a small group of oligarchs suddenly take over the government and decide to imprison those who opposed the government at any point in time. The government forces, or more likely pays Meta (WhatsApp’s parent company) to hand over all the data about people who sent such messages. And you would be on the list. Now, you might say that it happened in the past, before such a crackdown on people opposing fascism was in place, but what does a fascist state care? There is nothing stopping them from arresting whomever they want, so they will do it. They don’t care that it’s illegal, they’re above the law. They are the law. Additionally, private communications in such a regime are very important for the organization of protests and other rebellions.
A good example of a way data is be used for genocide is WhatsApp. The IDF (Israeli Defense Forces) uses data to identify targets by using machine learning to parse it and detect them.
Conclusion Link to heading
Ultimately, it’s your choice how to take care of your privacy. If your prefer convenience over privacy and don’t see the arguments I wrote as a dealbreaker, by all means, go for it. I’m not going to stop you from doing so, I just believe people should know the importance of privacy.