Navigating the Digital Frontier: Convenience versus Privacy Living in a Connected World
What if I told you that you were being monitored right now? I can guarantee it in fact, since you are reading this online. The device you are using to read this very article is collecting about you this instant, and it is using that data to build a profile about you. Whilst it may seem that these devices we slip into our back pocket are made and sold for our convenience as consumers, I think it's naïve to ignore the implications of carrying around little data collectors with us at all times. And even when we ‘switch off’ nowadays, I would argue we are still tangled in a web of interconnected devices all around us. The proliferation of web-connected devices into our lives has made our lives more efficient and innovation continues every day, but each new device offers a new way for companies to observe your habits and keep track of your life. Today I will be discussing the implications of our journey into an evermore digital world, both positive and negative, with a specific focus on the intersection of privacy and the Internet of Things.
Is my phone listening to me?
It has become a common phenomenon that people report having a conversation with someone about something peculiar, something they swear they haven’t ever mentioned before, and then an hour later, an ad about said thing somehow makes its way onto the feed of their favourite social media site, or in their google recommended ads when they are searching the web. It can feel invasive and, with the advent of always-on internet assistants on our devices such as Google Assistant and Siri, I know I certainly have asked if my devices are monitoring my conversations, waiting to advertise me more products. Well, the simple answer to this question is yes, but the more complicated answer isn’t just that a man is listening to your conversations and serving up adverts specifically targeted about that niche product you were just talking to your grandma about. Instead, digital companies work to build an understanding of who you are based on the data they collect in more simple ways — your google searches, your social media profile visits, the websites you access and the ones your friends access too; just to name a few of the data points they use. At this point, the microphone in your phone won’t be giving access to the most valuable data about you, but instead your digital footprint will, and this is the data that is so invaluable to companies.
“The point is, advertisers don’t need to listen to know everything about you.” Mariano delli Santi, legal and policy officer with data protection advocate Open Rights Group
How do I withdraw my data?
So at this point, I may have made you feel a little uncomfortable and I apologise for that. It can feel like an itch you can’t scratch or like someone is watching you but you can’t see who it is, when you realise that digital companies may know you better than you even know yourself. How do I stop them collecting my data then? Usually, companies aim to get your consent for their data collection activities and this will come in the form of apps permissions, terms of service contracts and more recently the creation of cookie notification and acceptance. In the UK, companies are bound by the General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR), whereby personal data collection is limited by principles of lawfulness, fairness and transparency. Companies looking to keep British citizens’ data must be explicit about what information they collect, keep it accurate and up to date, keep it for no longer than is necessary, and process it in a manner that ensures security. This regulation has vastly reduced the odds of British personal data being leaked, and can help to make us more comfortable using our devices and parting ways with our information. If you still feel like you are being spied on, by all means check your settings and remove permissions from your apps — as other students have pointed out, Google Timeline can access a record of everywhere you have ever been when you have had geolocation on and your phone in your pocket, so turning off location services may be a start. If you are anything like me however, you may be thinking that turning off these permissions will reduce the functionality of your device. That’s the trade off I’m afraid, convivence or privacy.
Convenience or privacy: the Internet of Things
The trade-off between convenience and privacy doesn’t just concern our smartphones, but all our smart devices. The procession into an increasingly digital world has led to a proliferation of internet-connected devices that are marketed to be placed in our homes to make our lives easier, and these can come in the form of voice-activated hubs that can control our home at the sound of a command, robot powered vacuums that map our house for mess, or even internet-connected refrigerators that monitor when your food will go bad. These devices create a network of physical objects embedded with sensors and software that enable them to connect and exchange data with each other and the central system through the Internet — this is called the Internet of Things (IoT). The IoT represents this frontier between convenience and privacy most clearly, the products created and the machine learning happening tangentially to data collection can improve our lives incredibly but create new entry points for privacy invasion in our own homes. For example, the use of iRobot’s Roomba to vacuum the house has reduced the amount of housework for millions of families, and the addition of a microphone and mapping system means you can command it to clean in front of specific pieces of furniture, which to me sounds very much like the robot fuelled future people fantasized about when I was growing up. However, with the sensors and mapping ability of the Roomba, it seems poignant to ask why Amazon was interested in buying iRobot (and it wasn’t for the hardware). Now able to map out the interior of a customer’s home, Amazon can use this information however it wishes. By introducing these smart devices into our homes, we have effectively given consent for new monitoring techniques to these companies — but hey, as least it isn’t dusty in front of the couch anymore!
Conclusion and reflection
Living in a digital world has brought unprecedented convenience and innovation to our lives, thanks to the Internet of Things and the interconnected nature of the digital landscape. However, it has also raised significant privacy concerns — data collection, surveillance and privacy invasion threats are just a few of the challenges we face in this digital age. During this course, I have learned to question the advantages of living in a digital world; whilst the movement into an ever-interconnected world brings accessibility advantages in so many factors of life, we also lose more and more control of our personal data in the process. From chatbots that are modelled to learn through talking to us, to our smart devices that create such specific profiles about us based on our online activities, digital innovations aim to make our lives easier whilst taking away our data autonomy. This creates questions about data ownership and consent, which I had not fully considered at the beginning of this course: Who owns data and who should be able to access it? How do we give permission for our data to be used? What ethics should guide data collection? Should we be regulating against data collection? These are all subjective questions that each person will answer differently dependant on the level of privacy they want, but gaining the full context to how and what data is being collected is crucial to answering the question.
Furthermore, at the beginning of this course, I struggled with my own understanding of permissions in regard to using copyrighted images. Within my first assignment, I used diagrams from news articles to illustrate my points, without regarding how this would go against copyright rules. I learnt how to properly reference images and gain permission, which I think is rather apt for a course addressing the issues regarding privacy and the digital world. I have also improved my blog writing style through our assessments, and this is a skill lacking in my other university modules. Writing about the fascinating nature of living within a digital world in an engaging and less formal style has given me more confidence in my ability to reach a reader through the page. Through engaging with the ideas of other students on the course, I have enlightened myself to new perspectives on the topics discussed and can now consider these ideas when further exploring the implications of our ever-increasing digital society.
