'Thousands of Companies Are Spying On You' (cnn.com) 170
Security guru Bruce Schneier warns that "thousands of companies" are spying on us and manipulating us for profit. An anonymous reader quotes his article on CNN:
Harvard Business School professor Shoshana Zuboff calls it "surveillance capitalism." And as creepy as Facebook is turning out to be, the entire industry is far creepier. It has existed in secret far too long, and it's up to lawmakers to force these companies into the public spotlight, where we can all decide if this is how we want society to operate and -- if not -- what to do about it...
Surveillance capitalism drives much of the internet. It's behind most of the "free" services, and many of the paid ones as well. Its goal is psychological manipulation, in the form of personalized advertising to persuade you to buy something or do something, like vote for a candidate. And while the individualized profile-driven manipulation exposed by Cambridge Analytica feels abhorrent, it's really no different from what every company wants in the end... Surveillance capitalism is deeply embedded in our increasingly computerized society, and if the extent of it came to light there would be broad demands for limits and regulation. But because this industry can largely operate in secret, only occasionally exposed after a data breach or investigative report, we remain mostly ignorant of its reach...
Regulation is the only answer.The first step to any regulation is transparency. Who has our data? Is it accurate? What are they doing with it? Who are they selling it to? How are they securing it? Can we delete it...? The market can put pressure on these companies to reduce their spying on us, but it can only do that if we force the industry out of its secret shadows.
The article also insists that "None of this is new," pointing out that companies like Facebook and Google offer their free services in exchange for your data.
But he also notes that there are now already 2,500 to 4,000 data brokers just in the U.S., including Equifax.
Surveillance capitalism drives much of the internet. It's behind most of the "free" services, and many of the paid ones as well. Its goal is psychological manipulation, in the form of personalized advertising to persuade you to buy something or do something, like vote for a candidate. And while the individualized profile-driven manipulation exposed by Cambridge Analytica feels abhorrent, it's really no different from what every company wants in the end... Surveillance capitalism is deeply embedded in our increasingly computerized society, and if the extent of it came to light there would be broad demands for limits and regulation. But because this industry can largely operate in secret, only occasionally exposed after a data breach or investigative report, we remain mostly ignorant of its reach...
Regulation is the only answer.The first step to any regulation is transparency. Who has our data? Is it accurate? What are they doing with it? Who are they selling it to? How are they securing it? Can we delete it...? The market can put pressure on these companies to reduce their spying on us, but it can only do that if we force the industry out of its secret shadows.
The article also insists that "None of this is new," pointing out that companies like Facebook and Google offer their free services in exchange for your data.
But he also notes that there are now already 2,500 to 4,000 data brokers just in the U.S., including Equifax.
Spying (Score:5, Funny)
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There's a good solution to this though.
Hunt down those that write things like that into their EULAs, and donate their organs to those in need.
Thousands of lives saved, AND problem solved.
Re: Spying (Score:2)
Make the right to privacy unwaivable. Just because we have a terrible legal system now, doesn't mean the law HAS TO be evil.
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Or an event that popped up on your facebook feed because a friend was going?
You have never craved and eventually bought fast food after seeing an ad?
Or bought something in a store that was only familiar to you through an ad? You didn't expect to buy that Cider or brand of Beer.....but you saw the ad and had awareness....and hey, why not?
Many advertisers advertise to brand. Not expecting you will impulse buy.
You have never seen a
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I am quite poor. I buy few things beyond my rent and limited diet. And used books. And cell and internet service, of course.
I recently bought a Green Cheeked Conure to replace an Amazon Parrot that passed away. And I bought a lot of new toys and such.
Little of what I buy is advertised. Coffee maybe. Reading about coffee will sometime make me want a cup.
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While it is true that I may catch some "brand elements" in my peripheral vision, I am pretty good at just not seeing ads. (If they are animated at all, I have to cover that part of the page so that I can read the content.) But, as I said above, practically nothing I spend money on is advertised.
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You have never bought a ticket to an event or movie you saw advertised online?
We need to distinguish between functiona ads and psychological ads. Funtional ads are like when I need a plumber I search for plumbers in my area and find their websites and pick one. So that is me responding to an advert, but functionally because I do not know any plumbers otherwise. And BTW, I don't pick the one with the website with most bling. Similarly if I want to buy eg a camera I look at camera makers websites to see what they have on offer, factually, the specifications, combined with studying
Re: Spying (Score:5, Insightful)
No, you bought the things you wanted, but what you wanted was guided by the advertising. Everyone thinks ads don't effect them, but industry pours billions in. Why? Because sales numbers show it does effect them.
I remember noticing it was 5:00 on the fifth once, and pulling into a local subway, I noticed the song in the back of my head "five, five dollar footling" from the ads, the 5:00 made me think of them and decide I wanted a sub. I insure with Geico because the lizard ads. It's just laziness, when we want something, we query the info in our brains to think of where we can get it, and the ads are there.
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The ads mainly affect the people buying the ads, they are scammed. Ads on the internet, sell me stuff, like WTF? I am on the internet, the ads sell me nothing, I have access to the internet, anything I want to buy I look up, check, evaluate options, and then decide whether to meh, buy nothing or buy a particular something, that often decide by the closest purchase opportunity. So advertisings sells me nothing, that is just the way it is.
Look straight up, the numbers mean it is all bullshit. You know gave t
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anything I want to buy I look up, check, evaluate options, and then decide whether to meh
I do the exact same thing, but I feel pretty confident that advertising is involved. From subtle advertising for brand awareness (e.g., that Nike ad you saw on the way to work on the side of a bus) to paid placement (e.g., those adword results in the google searches as you researched products). It's never going to outright cause you to pick a specific product, it influences your decision. It most of the time will ensure their product is at least part of the evaluation, which it might not have been otherw
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The ad serves to let you know company A exists at all and is still a player. You absofuckinglutely are influenced. Way, wayyyyyy deeper than you think. In fact, the people who are denying this are easier to influence... Queue xfiles themes..
I don't need adverts to tell me that Ford and BMW cars exist, or Kellog's cornflakes, or Budweiser beer. I see them around anyway, and I do not buy them anyway (as it happens). I am one of your people denying, but as for my being influenced, I don't even see many adverts. I live in the sticks, never watch TV directly (record programmes and fast forward the ads), and I've got adblocker on. I have a Pentax camera, and Pentax are [in]famous for not advertising (one reason I chose them), and I've never seen
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I have never bought anything as a result of seeing an ad on a web page.
It's a naive person that thinks they aren't effected by advertising. Everyone is.
If you ask 100 people 99 of them will give an answer like yours: their buying habits aren't effected by advertising. But for some unknown reason, hundreds of billions of dollars are pumped into ads each year. Why do you think that is? Because companies haven't been able to figure out after 100 years and billions spent in market research that ads don't work?
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I find that impossible to believe. Maybe you have never consciously bought anything due to an ad you saw on a web page.
I can balance that by there are things I consciously do not buy because I've seen their ad. A brand of chocolates had an advert some years ago that was so silly that I have never bought it since (no problem, the rival brand costs and tastes the same). Also, when choosing between two brands, if all other things are equal (AFAIK), I choose the one that is advertised less because with the other I feel that the money is going into advertising rather than quality.
Re: Spying (Score:2)
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Every breath you take,
Every move you make,
Every bond you break,
Every step you take,
I'll be watching you.
Sting
Try The Hymn of Acxiom [bandcamp.com] for a more direct take by Vienna Teng. If you can someone singing into a fan, anyway:
The Hymn of Acxiom
somebody hears you. you know that. you know that.
somebody hears you. you know that inside.
someone is learning the colors of all your moods, to
(say just the right thing and) show that you’re understood.
here you’re known.
leave your life open. you don’t have. you don’t have.
leave your life open. you don’t have to hide.
someone is gathering every crumb you drop, these
(mindless decisions and) moments you long forgot.
keep them all.
let our formulas find your soul.
we’ll divine your artesian source (in your mind),
marshal feed and force (our machines will)
to design you a perfect love—
or (better still) a perfect lust.
o how glorious, glorious: a brand new need is born.
now we possess you. you’ll own that. you’ll own that.
now we possess you. you’ll own that in time.
now we will build you an endlessly upward world,
(reach in your pocket) embrace you for all you’re worth.
is that wrong?
isn’t this what you want?
amen.
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The problem is bigger than your bubble.
Answering with "I don't care." invites us to not care about your self-interested opinion.
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Eventually some law will be passed that you will violate, and these companies that you don't bother bothering with are going to catch you and you will wind up likely doing some time in a private prison, for someone else's profit.
Do you trust your government with the info the snoops scarf up? How about the local DA who needs to boost their conviction ratio so the private prison people don't fill the war chest of the person running against them?
Of course, there are other governments. You know that extraditi
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Hello there comrade! How goes the trolling today? Well I hope.
You know that extradition treaties let someone in the US be hauled off to Thailand for execution if they make a crack about the Thai royalty?
No, they don't. Perhaps in your homeland, but not in the US.
Eventually some law will be passed that you will violate, and these companies that you don't bother bothering with are going to catch you and you will wind up likely doing some time in a private prison, for someone else's profit.
No, they won't. People in prison don't contribute to the economy by buying stuff and they don't pay taxes. Corporations like profits. Governments like taxes.
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Guess you've never heard of the Geo group or Corrections Corporation of America (now called CoreCivic).
You're right. I'm not a professional troll like yourself so I wouldn't have.
CCA and other prison companies have written “occupancy guarantees” into their contracts
I see. That's pretty much the same as the government rounding up people with evidence from their Facebook pages. It's a perfectly reasonable next step. You're a very smart person and I'm sorry I questioned your mighty brain.
Re: Spying (Score:1)
WHAT WE SAID: We need common sense gun laws.
WHAT YOU HEARD: Take away all the guns, melt them, and make a statue of an NFL player kneeling.
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WHAT WE SAID: We need common sense gun laws.
WHAT MOST OF YOU MEANT BUT WOULDN'T SAY SO NOT TO ALARM PEOPLE: We need an Australian-style gun ban.
There are *already* "common sense gun laws" on the books. These laws *should have prevented* most if not all of the recent mass-shootings IF they had been *enforced* properly!
You don't need *new* gun laws, just for-deity's-sake enforce the ones we already have! What the hell makes anyone think that creating more laws will help when the laws already in place that should have stopped these homicidal lunatics we
Re: Spying (Score:1)
I agree that an Australian ban and buyback would be great; however, it's a hard task to convince 38 states of this constitutional amendment.
I agree that there's an enforcement problem, but that starts with the president. Because the mental illness gun ban was only an executive order, Trump was able to unilaterally rescind it; so we do need a new law passed by the legislature to make this enforceable, and take him to court when laws are not being enforced.
The Parkland shooter legally purchased an AR-15, perh
Re: Spying (Score:2)
Whenever I hear the words "common sense" in a political discussion, I know I'm listening to an idiot telling a lie.
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Let them spy to their heart's content. If they're using me for marketing they're going to be very disappointed.
I have just taken a look at what Google has on me, following the Guardian article's advice, and it is miles out. Literally thousands of miles out as they think I'm in Australia (but I'm in Europe). According to my Ad profile, they think I'm interested in celebrities and mothercare - WTF ?? I've never serched for those things in my life
They actually invite you to add more topics, the cheeky bastards. I'm glad Im wasting their time.
Hmm... (Score:2)
Re:Hmm... (Score:5, Informative)
slashdot.org
adnxs.com
advertising.com
contextweb.com
crsspxl.com
d3tglifpd8whs6.cloudfront.net
districtm.ca
fsdn.com
google-analytics.com
googletagservices.com
janrain.com
licdn.com
lijit.com
ml314.com
pro-market.net
rpxnow.com
rubiconproject.com
slashdotmedia.com
stack-sonar.com
taboola.com
truste.com
So, maybe just a little bit.
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don't you mean those are the scripts that _want_ to run, but can't because you're running noscript and it's blocking them...
Re:Hmm... (Score:5, Informative)
But when I look at it, once you give temp permissions it reloads with even more scripts that I then had to allow.
In addition to the above list, that added:
a3cloud.net
acuityplatform.com
bidswitch.net
d29usylhdk1xyu.cloudfront.net
d6uon097akywu.cloudfront.net
demdex.net
districtm.io
dotomi.com
doubleclick.net
google.com
janrain.xyz
linkedin.com
scorecardresearch.com
sitescout.com
trustarc.com
Now I have to kill all the temp permissions and just leave the ones I must allow in order to use
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WTF? Running scripts other than slashdot? Man, your uBlock/uMatrix/NoScript must be off.
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The thing that baffles me the most when sites do this, is how stupid to the siterunners have to be? I mean like, when you're adding scripts and you get to the 20th one and you realize you need 20 different scripts to get the 20 analytics you want each with their own 20 kitchen sinks and 20 foreign corps getting a 'free' copy of your analytics to use to sell ads to your competitors... at what point do they go, hmm, maybe I should write my own analytics script or install piwik or something.
These are not analytics for the site owner. They are third parties who pay the site owner to get data about the site owner's users. The site owners aren't being stupid - in many cases this is the best way for them to get money.
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Nice try Google and Facebook (Score:5, Insightful)
We know you're trying to muddy the waters and use the "everybody does it" rationalization. "Thousands of companies" aren't using search and social networking and Android monopoly power to spy on us like you guys are. It's only you doing that.
"Thousand of companies" also don't have PR problems due to arrogant, dismissive management. That's a Google and Facebook problem.
"Thousands of companies" haven't lost the trust of their audience by trying to impose Silicon Valley "values" on them. That's a Google and Facebook problem.
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While it's true that
"Thousands of companies" haven't lost the trust of their audience by trying to impose
most companies with web presence try to use cookies to trace people. Often, admittedly, only to improve service, but you can't know what their purposes are, and so many lie that you can't trust their explanations.
Do you actually think you can use a credit card anywhere without *some* company spying on you? You can argue justification, and that's not totally wrong, but it doesn't change the actuality. And any time "customer data" is lost in a security breach, you know that some amount
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"Thousands of companies" aren't using search and social networking and Android monopoly power to spy on us like you guys are. It's only you doing that.
You're right. Only a few companies are doing that, the others wanted to do that from the onset but didn't get the market capture to succeed. You may not remember registration cards, loyalty programs, surveys, but this concept long pre-dates the internet, hell it was a feature of electronic payment.
"Thousand of companies" also don't have PR problems due to arrogant, dismissive management. That's a Google and Facebook problem.
Actually they quite often do. The difference is if you don't have 2bn customers around the world your PR tends to be more localised. Think only a few years back when Target started sending a pregnant girl advertis
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And google and Facebook are enablers for many of these companies allowing said companies unnecessary access to your data.
Please link to any data breach associated with Google, or where I can buy Google user data.
Re: Nice try Google and Facebook (Score:2)
Have patience, it will happen.
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And when it does, I'll address it. Until then, I don't need to make up imaginary problems. There are enough real ones.
Re: No Shit (Score:2)
I've know all this for years, but the Facebook thing hit me hard.
I mean think about it, you go to a restaurant, you give them money, they give you a cupcake. The cupcake pays nothing, but things don't end well for it.
The thing I realize now is I AM THE CUPCAKE with these companies. I thought it was about it them living of venture capital building user base waiting to monetize, I thought money from advertising meant other fools were paying for it all by clicking on ads and I had the game beat, but what it re
Just like casinos (Score:4, Insightful)
This is why I always browse the internet (Score:5, Funny)
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https://www.extremetech.com/ex... [extremetech.com]
If you're into conspiracies, (Score:4, Informative)
It's rather depressing (Score:5, Interesting)
When I bring this up with many (perhaps most) of my friends and co-workers, the prevalent attitude seems to be "we've already lost, there's no reason to resist".
Another thing is when I mention it at work - what I hear back from certain faculty is how Google and Amazon are giving us a lot of money, so we're going to pretend none of this is a concern.
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Simple minds usually need to reduce their world to "us-them" terms. Similarly, if less obviously, is the need to reduce scenarios to binary conditions. Won/lost.
There are thousands of vectors using thousands of approaches seeking thousands of data points, relying on thousands of dependencies. Almost of them are invisible.
That last part only furthers the argument to spray-and-pray. Don't bother figuring out which are fallible. And certainly don't be so naive as to think you'll find them.
You don't seal your w
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Do you also hear about why people happily hand over data? Google knows my location as I travel down the highway. That's scary. A company like that could provide real time traffic information that makes my trip to work better. Just one example, but the bottom line is people don't use Google and Facebook for the exercise of handing over their data if they didn't get something in return.
The same applies to membership programs. I'm not a Marriott member because I want them spying on me, and knowing which airlin
HAHA! (Score:2, Insightful)
Advertising? You really think this is about selling you trash?
This is the New World Order's wet dream.
Having any and all information to hang over any challengers stupid enough to think Justice and Liberty for all.
It's over folks. And you can thank the dumb bastards who cry "tin foil hat conspiracy theory" at any and all suggestions that "our" leaders aren't serving their constituents and their nation.
Good bye... it hasn't been fun and it will get much much worse before things improve. 1984 was written in 19
I reserve the right to completely ignore (Score:2)
and mock your paranoid concept of a new world order.
Isn't that just code for some ethnocultural group that you particularly despise?
Get a grip and worry about your own shit. You just wish that whatever you're doing was important enough that some mysterious figment of your fevered brain cabal would actually care to include a moment's thought about you in their grand plan. Get a feckin' grip.
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Actually, what I read was that 1984 was a fictionalized presentation of what Orwell saw in Spain in 1948. He was describing a present, not warning of a future. If you want warning, you can make a better case for Animal Farm. Not that people paid attention to either.
But he wasn't late to the game. Centralized control by non-human actors wasn't possible even in 1948, though it had started by then. Prior attempts depended on compliance of local political leaders, and fell apart when, e.g., Henry VIII want
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I couldn't help hearing a Russian accent when reading.
It's over folks.
What is over is the Russian propaganda machine. In 2 years your tactics will be so out in the open they'll be useless, and you'll be sent back to the potato farm away from your cushy job trolling the filthy westerners.
I just assume they are all spying on me (Score:3)
Now if someone would compile a list of companies who aren't watching every click and hover, that would be helpful.
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Not really.
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Companies are not going to give up their moneymaker, and there are likely people who need services on their job. For example, a lot of places use Facebook for organizing events.
The Libertarian style of "let businesses make a profit" doesn't work. 1929 and 2008 showed this to be true. Hell, Europe is so pissed at US companies that they enacted sweeping laws just to go against them, which US countries can't abide by due to domestic legislation (the CLOUD act.)
The only way to fix this is with regulation.
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You describe what you've had to do to go off-grid, and it's extraordinarily restrictive. And you think *regulation* is a poor solution? Sheesh.
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I choose not to own a "smart" TV. I don't utilize any Facebook, Apple, or Microsoft product and little of Google outside of search- and even that much I avoid. I utilize a stripped down version of Android without the proprietary Google parts and I'm trying to get away from cellular devices.
And yet, how is your life better than mine? What tangible difference has depriving corporations of your user data made in your life?
I mean, beyond allowing you to feel superior than the rest of us. That' clearly an advantage.
choose to NOT utilize products and services of companies which endanger my privacy
How are you endangered? Please, nothing hypothetical.
I work toward elimination of drivers licenses, license plates, vehicular registration, and similar.
Ah yes. The "I don't want to pay taxes so I'll couch it as a privacy issue" approach. Nice one!
I moved to New Hampshire as part of the Free State Project so that I could join other like minded individuals
Hot hippie babes. Got it.
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The Goog is gonna give to a *sweet* bonus.
I'm still waiting.
Comment removed (Score:5, Interesting)
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You might not be able to avoid the spycraft, but you can certainly derail its end goal. Reduce, reuse, and recycle goods you buy. Avoid major brands, and branded consumer holidays like Christmas. Repair instead of replacing old coats, gloves, and household small appliances. Look up a cobbler in your city, as there certainly exists one or more, and resole your shoes and boots instead of buying new ones.
While the goal is noble you've just described being poor and that carries a stigma of its own. Your 5 times repaired coat is not likely to get you a pat on the back for sticking it to the man as much as confused looks from the people around you saying you should be buying a new one.
Society has helped kill the repair scene.
Regulation (Score:2)
Is always the answer. (sigh)
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If they give companies "personhood", (Score:1)
First order of business should be a stalking charge.
The internet undermines.. (Score:3)
... people's ability to influence company policies, nowhere is this seen more clearly then videogames and the tech community more generally. Basically companies have literally taken software hostage, literally theft. The new model is to undermine ownership of peoples software and machines and turn them into dumb walled garden terminals.
The reason is technology has undermined the very basis of western civ by companies NOT having to physically give you a product they can cut the software into pieces and keep part of it on their server which forces radical transparency and complete lack of privacy. The only way out would be to have some kind of say in how these companies are run and most people are too stupid and ideologically kept to capitalism. A rational society would see private ownership model is impossible post interneet because you'd need geographic proximity to force companies to stop producing software and other tech in a fraudulent and hostile manner. Most people are too ignorant, unconcerned and illiterate to request the policies that would force companies to stop basically comiting fraud on a massive scale. But either way the internet finally breaks any kind of consumer or power the general public might have had to influence companies.
And don't give me any "consumer has a choice" bs, the only way you'd have a choice is if you had money and power co equal to the bottomless well of cash on hand at the behest of mega corporations this is not an individual problem. It's the natural result of technology undermining the basis of the relationship where companies can simply now force policies they could never get away with pre internet because they wouldn't get paid pre internet they had to give you control over the thing you were buying.
even your government is in on it . (Score:3)
In my case it's the city, county, state and federal government. They require me to interact via MailChimp and similar services. They process financial transactions and set appointments via outside services. Presumably the bureaucrats are saving money by giving up citizens' privacy. Possibly some particular bureaucrat is getting a kickback from these companies.
These services typically don't identify themselves- at the top of every page is the logo of a government agency, even though the URL is for a dot com. They are fraudulently impersonating the government at our expense! And, of course you won't find any privacy policy on those pages except perhaps that of the government. If you do find the corporation and its privacy policy, it will say that they may share your data with 'affiliates', which means anyone they want to call an affiliate when the mood strikes them.
If you have a driver license, social security account, military connection, utility bills, or any other business with any government--you may have no alternative. Oh, by the way, many non-profits are also selling you out this way.
What to do (Score:5, Insightful)
Get a good VPN and put that in a router. So every network connection is not from your IP and ISP.
Support a good AV brand that finds a lot of malware and nation funded spyware.
Put no script and use other methods to protect a browser.
Look into who is creating and funding the browser. Are they pro privacy?
Dont use social media.
Dont let social media get your cell phone details.
Don't connect a "smart" TV to the internet. Use a stand alone device just for streaming.
Dont bring in a networked microphone and camera product from a company that sells ads.
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Firstly, I don't particularly care whether the whole of the internet knows my shopping / browsing history, likes and dislikes. I'll enable some basic privacy measures mostly to limit ads because I dislike those resource hogs, but by and large I don't consider myself to be interesting enough for others to give a damn. But from a rhetorical standpoint, how does one truly eliminate their exposure to this while still interacting with others who don't?
Take email for example, I could set up my own email server an
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Bring data to the display. Use a streaming device to support just one streaming service when needed.
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Another brilliant insight (Score:2)
No shit, Sherlock. Of course they are trying to find out everything possible about every potential consumer. They have always done that, from the invention of commerce in maybe 8000 BC. It's just that a lot more information that is easily available (for a pittance) than ever before.
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You underestimate totally the power of gossipy women since roughly 8000 B.C. Profiling, demographics, data mining. 3rd party tracking....those "stitch and bitch" sewing circle sessions had it all
Good luck to them; I don't see targeted ads and (Score:1)
Privacy / data protection would be a start (Score:4, Informative)
So if the US wants to see where it should be going, look to Europe. The problem of course is it will never happen. Legislators are afraid of the data collection industry and would be too chicken shit to do anything to meaningfully rein it in.
European Union GDPR (Score:3)
That and much more is what the EU General Data Protection Regulation [wikipedia.org] mandates. Now we just need to push it to the rest of the world via trade treaties.
Targeting the REAL problem. (Score:2)
Surveillance Capitalism isn't the real problem. What feeds it, is. Bruce ignorantly assumes that people still give a shit about privacy. Professional Narcissist and Attention Whore are now paid professions, and oversharing is considered a social mantra. The masses worry about privacy about as much as a porn star worries about having sex in front of a camera.
In order to enact change, you have to get people to start giving a shit about privacy again, which would likely mean no more free internet services,
News? (Score:2)
public secret (Score:2)
this is known for a long time already, why is everybody acting so surprised these days about all these privacy issues?