
The Current State of Privacy
Submission by @XxEIDOLONxX (Discord, Reddit, Facebook Group)
Privacy, as stated in the dictionary, is the state or condition of being free from being observed or disturbed by other people. The problem with privacy today is that no one is free from a wandering eye or being observed, with or without permission. For example, let’s say you are having a conversation with a friend in person about a topic. All of a sudden you see an ad on Facebook for a particular product; similar to what you just discussed. Facebook has had several claims which are denied by them of listening in on conversations in which they even request to allow access to your phone’s microphone if you download their app. Another example is maybe you search for food on Google and place an order. Next thing you know you are seeing ads for food and “click here to get a coupon”. This is a result of increasingly invasive methods of data mining by large corporations.
There have been countless stories of “data leaks” where personal photos, credit card or social security information have been stolen. These data leaks are often sold to the highest bidder on the dark web and used with malicious intent. This is a strong case for decentralization, much like we see in the crypto space. No longer will we have to entrust our personal data to these centralized targets. Even big tech companies such as Google want to collect your data to sell to the highest bidder to give you targeted ads. Some people are ok with this. Others are not. There was even a case where the Alexa assistant sent a recording of a conversation without permission to a contact. This is a massive security risk and invasion of privacy. These companies shouldn’t have access to everything and anything belonging to you. Are you really ok with that?
Normally large corporations are more than willing to comply with law enforcement to hand over your data, often breaking their privacy policies in the process. A rare exception to this was the Apple vs FBI case. Apple has end to end encryption with their messages making it impossible for anyone to see these unless accessed through the phone. Apple took a stand against the FBI and forced them to pay a third party company to eventually hack the iPhone of the criminal. The issue worth mentioning here is: if Apple were to actually comply, it would have put all their users at risk.
There are additional things to take into account when dealing with privacy. In this technological world we live in, everything and everyone is more interconnected than ever before. You might have an email account, cell phone, or even a computer that can log your location, things searched for or purchased. We also have social media which has been a huge target for collecting massive amounts of data and selling it. It’s pretty difficult to live off the grid anymore. and you would have to give up certain “quality of life features” that new technology can provide.
Something that really gets me excited about the Odin project is their flagship application. Running on their blockchain is an end to end encrypted messenger. It’s going to be safe, easy to use, and most of all private. Everything will be running through masternodes and service nodes (once up) to send messages, multimedia files and even wallet to wallet transactions. This allows for everything to be decentralized, meaning there won’t be any large data center storing your information. Instead, these nodes I mentioned earlier, are ran on VPSes or even on computers that are daily used at home. All the power is handed back to the users. They also have a huge focus on user experience, making me really excited to see how intuitive it will be.
