The Privacy Problem
With Cambridge Analytica and Facebook making the headlines in their recent saga, it is imperative that we keep our information secure as the world becomes increasingly connected.
What is Privacy micro-violation?
Privacy micro-violation is the usage of your private information as a micropayment in exchange for access to or for reduced costs for an online service.
Levels of Privacy
These are the various levels of privacy that we can define in a broad sense, the yellow represents information that we may not consider as very critical. This is where the majority of our privacy micro violations take place.
We give out data in the yellow region quite frequently, and do not think twice about it. This data is collected and used to form statistical correlations about you and people like you, in order that certain forms of messaging can be used to manipulate the way you may shop, vote or behave.
In addition, centralized stores of information, especially those that contain user’s privately identifiable information, is always at risk. As the amount of hacks and data leaks keeps increasing, is it prudent of us to keep the data in the red and yellow at a centralized location?
Why is privacy important?
We can imagine a world where it is impossible for anyone to hide anything and can believe that it might be safer than the present. However, the issue here is there is an asymmetry of information with regards to what an adversary knows about you, and what can be analyzed about you. You may not even know what is out there in the public domain about you.
Issues
There are real world issues with regards to privacy, as shown below: i
- Synthetic Identities
As per this article, $6 Billion in 2016 was lost due to synthetic identities. This is not a big amount for the banking and financial industry. However, it is definitely an issue for victims or the people whose identities were partially stolen. A Synthetic Identity theft, involves capturing small bits of information from different users and creating a new identity with various stolen bits and pieces.
2. Persuasive Digital Marketing
As the above slide deck shows, we are slowly progressing into fine-tuned lab rats. While our personal data is used to fine-tune algorithms in a race to manipulate us, is this really the world that we want to live in?
Suggestions / Solutions
- Use Open Source Applications that have a focus on privacy.
- Avoid being the Product
- Use decentralized Apps to earn and be part of the network.
- Once we have more usage of dApps, there will be less Information Asymmetry, better data protection and transparency.
Examples
Basic Attention Token — The BAT token works with the Brave browser and pays users for their exposure to advertisements. It pays publishers as well in a way that preserves privacy.
traceto.io — Know Your Customer (KYC) processes could possibly increase the risks of breaching of privacy. However, we at traceto.io strive to find a balance of maintaining privacy and at the same time providing the best possible KYC services.
About traceto.io
traceto.io is a decentralised Know Your Customer (KYC) network that provides an inclusive KYC solution to cryptocurrency and blockchain product companies by fusing Smart Contract and Artificial Intelligence technologies. Leveraging on over 5 decades of experience in Compliance and RegTech, traceto.io’s vision is to bridge the gap between the real and virtual world KYC processes.
Telegram: https://t.me/tracetoio
Website: https://traceto.io/
Twitter: https://twitter.com/tracetoio
