Your Private Information Might Not Be So Private
In the eyes of companies around the world, you are a walking treasure trove of information. They wish to know what you eat, how you sleep, your interests, and much much more. Put simply, companies wish to know this information so that they can profit from it. They may either directly use it to sell you things that you might like or they may sell it to an undisclosed third party. But what if you do not approve of how your data is used by this party? In order to ethically use data, it is necessary to know and consider the context in which the data was collected and to be transparent with how the data will be utilized.
The last time that you received a scam call or email, did you wonder how they might have gotten your contact information? There is a high likelihood that your information was collected by a company and sold to another for a high price. I remember that when I was younger, I was curious as to why it seemed like all of a sudden I was getting way more spam emails and phone calls than ever before. I thought back to where I had given out my email recently and then it clicked. At the time, I was around thirteen years old or so, I had been getting free gift cards from a website just by completing a bunch of surveys. Many of those surveys would ask for my email at the beginning and I would readily give it. I believed that the website was giving out my email so I decided to put this theory to the test. I started using an alias when I would complete the surveys. Sure enough, soon I was getting spam emails addressed to one, “Jake Anderson”. I decided that from then on I would use that alias and email account for any websites that I didn’t trust.
What I didn’t realize at the time was that my information is collected and sold by a lot more companies than I thought, it’s just that most of them do not sell your information in such a direct manner. Even companies like Google collect and sell your information to advertisers. Advertisers value information such as: the amount of times you visit a website in a day, how long you spend on those websites, what you put in your cart to purchase, etc. However, advertisers and scammers are not the only people that wish to discover who you are through your user data.
It is no secret that Mark Zuckerberg testified in front of Congress back in April of 2018. However, not many people are aware of the exact reason why he did this. Essentially, he was being questioned on his involvement in the selling of almost 90 million users’ personal data, of which they were completely unaware. This data included birthdays, cities of residence, personal messages, and even the user’s current location. But who was this information shared with, why exactly would they want it, and why should you care?
In 2013, a Cambridge Analytica data scientist designed an app called “This Is Your Digital Life”, that would ask users survey questions in order to build a psychological profile. Over 300,000 users took the survey and granted the app access to their personal Facebook user data. What the participants didn’t realize was that the app also extracted the user data of the people who they were friends with on Facebook. This resulted in Cambridge Analytica having access to the user data of millions of people without their knowledge. In 2015, it was reported that Cambridge Analytica was using this data to help Ted Cruz during his presidential campaign. At the time, it was reported that Cruz had spent at least $750,000 on purchasing user information and Republican candidate Ben Carson had also paid $220,000 in that year alone. After this news came to light, Facebook threatened legal action unless the unethically obtained data was deleted from Cambridge Analytica’s databases. As you can see, the collection and distribution of people’s data can be a very lucrative endeavor.
Now you might be thinking, “Okay, but how big of an issue is this really?” The importance of this issue lies in the lack of transparency and trust between the data seller and the data provider. On the surface, certain information being shared with things like advertising agencies doesn’t seem like such a bad idea. In theory, your information being purchased allows for you to see ads for products that you have a higher likelihood of actually buying, resulting in you finding a new product that you enjoy and the company makes money from selling you that product. Sounds like a win-win right? The issue with that is that the person is almost never told what information exactly is being sold, what that information is being used for exactly, and to whom it is sold. Unbeknownst to the millions of people that had their data collected by Cambridge Analytica, their information was being used to meddle in the 2016 United States presidential election. Millions of users were left in the dark and exploited for political and economic gain without their consent. One of the core ideas of data justice is that it is extremely important that you understand how certain data was collected and for what purpose. In order to ethically use data, it is necessary to know and consider the context in which the data was collected and to be transparent with how the data will be utilized.
References
Meredith, S. (2018, April 10). Facebook-Cambridge Analytica: A timeline of the data hijacking scandal. CNBC; CNBC. https://www.cnbc.com/2018/04/10/facebook-cambridge-analytica-a-timeline-of-the-data-hijacking-scandal.html
Davies, H. (2015, December 11). Ted Cruz campaign using firm that harvested data on millions of unwitting Facebook users. The Guardian; The Guardian. https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2015/dec/11/senator-ted-cruz-president-campaign-facebook-user-data
The Economist. (2018, April 9). Why is Mark Zuckerberg testifying in Congress? The Economist; The Economist. https://www.economist.com/the-economist-explains/2018/04/09/why-is-mark-zuckerberg-testifying-in-congress
