Feeling Invaded? Time for a Revolution
A s of now, the internet’s most popular platforms, including browsers and websites, gather personal data from their users, such as information on who they are to what they do. Everything you do online is recorded and can be used by companies to make money. However, collecting and using data isn’t necessarily a bad practice. For instance, behavioral data on the internet can aid companies in producing more personalized content, which many people enjoy.
Those most influential, like Google, Amazon, and Facebook, understand that the world wide web made personal information the most valuable commodity. However, some people are starting to realise that this power shouldn’t be permitted to rest in the hands of only a few companies, and are experimenting with new technologies to provide an alternative.
There is data protection in the form of privacy agreements, but when this fountain of information called “big data” is governed by only a handful of companies, we run into problems because there are a variety of ways to breach your privacy without going against the law. Companies can control people’s online experiences in subtle ways, such as by tracking a person’s browsing habits. This is why specific ads follow you on every site you visit. Plus, when data is used to strengthen or sway political opinions, the outcomes can get troubling.
Answer through Blockchain
One method of building a decentralized internet, to break free from the power of big players that control our data, is through blockchain.
The blockchain is a distributed digital ledger of transactions, and it demonstrates how it is possible to work with a model of sharing data and information that’s not controlled by one or a few powerful corporations. Instead, data is kept in a network of computers all around the globe, each connected through cryptographic validation. In other words, this decentralized and distributed framework of sharing information is very secure and allows for greater privacy.
There are already numerous open-source services that want to see this happen. These are called decentralized applications where every record on these apps is stored through public and decentralized blockchain.
Some examples are:
Brave
What sets Brave apart is its aggressive anti-ad attitude. The browser was built to strip online ads from websites, and its maker’s business model relies not only on ad blocking but on replacing the scratched-out ads with advertisements from its network.
Brave is a more-or-less standard browser that lets users navigate to websites, run web apps and display or play online content. Like other browsers, it is free to download and use, remembers site authentication information and can block online ads from appearing on sites.
Brave will scrub sites of ads and ad tracking, then replace those ads with its advertisement, which will not be individually targeted but instead aimed at an anonymous aggregate of the browser’s user base. Brave has said it went that route rather than a simpler all-ad-elimination model because, while few users relish ads, many realise that without them, the commercial web as it now exists would be impossible. That’s why claimed Brave; it will not only do an ad swap — its advertisements for those originally displayed by a site — but create a monetary system that ultimately will compensate those same websites.
Straight from Brave’s privacy policy, “We are committed to ensuring that Brave users’ private personal data remains private. As such, we do not collect user-identifiable data, browsing history, or IP addresses.”
Blockstack
Take the Blockstack browser, which calls itself the “new internet” for decentralised apps. Blockstack permits users to access Dapps that offers services comparable to many of the cloud-based apps available on our usual internet.
Many of these apps are listed on the Blockstack website, including an online word processor named Graphite, a personal health hub called Afia, a podcast app, and a cryptocurrency portfolio app. These function like their counterparts on the normal internet, except they are all decentralized and encrypted to protect the individual’s privacy.
Cloud-based services have made our lives more comfortable, but they have also made the biggest tech companies privy to our lives, whether we are aware or not. It’s serious enough that the man who gave us the World Wide Web, Tim Berners-Lee himself, sees the need to reinvent the internet.
Is it time to re-evaluate your browsing strategy? And if you run a company, probably the right time to swap the browsers for your employees. Food for thought.
Helping you understand the fundamentals of blockchain and develop elegant blockchain solutions to empower your successful businesses into new technology spaces, BirthVenue.
Curious to explore blockchain for your company? Get in Touch with us at BirthVenue.in
Envisioning a world without intermediaries.
Sabarish Nair
Blockchain Analyst
