Zuckerberg: Privacy is no longer a social norm
We say we care about our data, yet we click ‘accept all’ to quickly get rid of the banner. We are scared of our phones tracking us, yet we enable location sharing because we need to use Google Maps and forget to disable it soon after. This discrepancy between our privacy concerns and the way we behave online is termed privacy paradox — a term coined by Susan Barnes.
It describes the phenomenon that we care about our data while not taking the appropriate steps to enforce our right to privacy. And scholars have racked their brains about why that could be for decades now. Common assumptions are that people lack self-efficacy — that is the idea that their efforts to protect their data create meaningful results. Other explanations are that short-term economic incentives, such as discounts or the avoidance of pay-walls, shift our cost-benefit analysis towards sharing information. This little weighing of ‘costs’ is also termed privacy calculus and it happens every time you put in your email address for that 10 % discount.
But the privacy paradox was conceptualized in 2006 — is it not outdated?
At least according to Mark Zuckerberg, it is. He stated that the social norm of privacy is over and done with. We do not care anymore — just take all you can get, Mark. Wishful thinking, in my opinion.
The rise of stronger data protection regulations such as the GDPR and the recent Digital Service Act shows that we do, indeed, still care about who knows what about us. And not just in an ideological sense, the concept of surveillance capitalism makes it pretty clear to most consumers why they are the economically disadvantaged party. Users have been commodified for decades now in a space that was initially supposed to serve us.
We are hyper-aware of our digital rights and how Big Tech companies consistently violate them — or at least try to circumvent them as much as possible.
In fact, TikTok just announced a change in their privacy policy that is a great example of how little they care: If you are an adult TikTok user in the EU, UK, or Switzerland, you will not be asked for consent for targeted advertising anymore from July 13th onwards. Instead, they rely on the ‘legitimate interest’ that they allegedly have in processing your data. Thanks, TikTok for showing us how to take advantage of every little vague wording in the GDPR — hopefully, we can soon close these loopholes.
The new privacy paradox as termed by Elizabeth Dubois describes that young people are well-informed about their right to privacy and why they still give it up — for example by using TikTok. She states that:
“[social media] sites have become so embedded in the social lives of users that they must disclose information on them despite the fact that these sites do not provide adequate privacy controls.”
In fact, her research showed that age is negatively correlated with privacy concerns, meaning that younger users are more aware of privacy risks.
But why do we give up on our privacy so easily then?
Dubois' findings reveal that we are aware of our rights and that most platforms we use do absolutely nothing to respect them, yet we choose to use them because it is part of our social life. I am guilty of that as well and I won’t change it; I explain why in my previous article. In a nutshell: The fact that we even have to decide between taking part in a big cultural chunk of our web and protecting our data is outrageous.
We should not be forced to accept adverse consequences because we want to share something with our network. With every other product, we would either expect it to serve us or switch to a competitor. This is the same situation. We have the right to vote on how we want our web to function.
As Buchanan would say: Voting with dollars. But data is money. We vote by giving our information. That is why I propose: Voting with trust.
Ultimately, if platforms do not comply with regulations, we need strong alternatives that show respect for our privacy, for us; and we need the willingness to switch platforms. We have a free web and we should make use of it. As a response to Mark, I can only say: Privacy is still a social norm, we are just being gaslit into giving it up.
