Are you data fit?

Apple’s latest move helps you see what you’re letting on to apps. Will it help?

Have you ever looked at the nutrition labels on your groceries before you bought them? If so, have you understood what they mean for your health? Nutrition labels are there to make societies healthier, by helping people make informed choices about what they buy and eat. But even the well-informed buyer finds it hard to figure out what is healthy for them. And many don’t have the time — most purchase decisions are made within seconds. But are nutrition labels better than none at all? Yes. We have a right to know what we’re buying and eating.

We also have a right to know what information about ourselves are seen by others. That’s why when you download an app, you have to read and accept the privacy policy. The privacy policy contains how much you let on about yourself to use the app.

Good thing then that most of them are tougher to read than the Harvard Law Review. And even better that many are designed for you to make them go away as quickly as possible. And for the Next Half Billion, it must be especially pleasing to see one which isn’t in the language you’re most comfortable with. After all, almost no privacy policy is in Hindi, let alone other local languages. Small wonder then that 98% of respondents in an research study agreed to provide their first born child as payment while downloading an app.

And that’s why we believe that Apple should take a bow for announcing the introduction of ‘nutrition labels’ for privacy. When you download and install an app on Apple’s iOS, these labels will summarise, in icons, the data that apps collect, which of these are linked to you, what they’re sharing with others and the like.

If Android wants to get ahead of the game, we’ve got just the thing to suggest! At Omidyar Network India, we funded IntAct, a project that tried to understand how people behave when making choices about their data. The bottom-line? While nutrition labels help, they aren’t the most effective solution.

Privacy ratings, just like energy ratings on your AC or washing machine, are more promising. When participants saw an app with a higher privacy rating, they trusted it more and were willing to share more information. Wouldn’t it be great if we could know which app will treat our data responsibly, and who’s playing fast-and-loose, according to independent experts?

But who could these “independent experts” be? App stores could face a conflict of interest, since the platforms host apps by the OS maker, for example, google maps on the play store.

It would be difficult for the government to do credibly too. It takes serious technical and operational capacity to evaluate the nearly 3 million apps on the play store consistently, or even the 500 most downloaded ones. And governments will also face conflicts of interest, as they now also develop their own apps, like BHIM and Aarogya Setu of the central government.

A good way may be through an independent body. After all, 77% of Indians trust technical experts — more than they trust government, media or businesses. In a country with high levels of digital illiteracy, the helping hand of a learned intermediary will go a long way!

For now, Apple’s nutrition labels will be a footnote in a country in which over 97% of smartphones use Android, backed by Google. But don’t forget: a year after launching the iPad in 2010, Steve Jobs asked “is 2011 gonna be the year of the copycats?” As far as privacy policies go, we really hope 2020 is more than the year of the cat.

Stay healthy. Stay curious.

P.s. to understand how broken privacy policies in India are, watch this two-minute video.