It is becoming more and more evident that privacy is dying. With all of the data breaches in the last decade it is almost impossible to thing that the majority of us have not been effected in some way. This brings up the unavoidable question of how important is privacy in our tech-centric world?
Advocates of privacy and right to be forgotten laws continually push for greater regulation and safe guarding of PPI (personal private information). Where these laws have hit hardest is on the financial and medical sectors. Between HIPAA and the Gramm-Leach-Bliley Act, medical and financial institutions have major guidelines and laws to follow on how to manage and safeguard PPI. While it isn’t 100% fool proof it has hardened into the daily operations of these institutions. What isn’t so cut and dry is how other FAANG type companies should handle customer data. (FAANG stands for Facebook, Apple, Amazon, Netflix, and Google). Mark Zuckerberg even testified in front of congress to plead Facebooks privacy case after a massive data breach.
The newest in a string of public privacy concerns is the US cellular providers giving access to customer locations to third party companies and data aggregators. These companies and aggregators can go so far as to allow for “bounty hunters” to have access to customer locations. So for a price your location is up for grabs. All of the major carriers are now publicly announcing the winding down of their selling of location information to these third parties, most state they have either already stopped or will stop sometime this year. The intended use for this information started with giving access to third party road side assistance companies and has snowballed from there. Many advocates that support the use of this information cite the “you have nothing to worry about as long as you aren’t doing anything wrong” statement as well as raise public safety concerns since police use this information to track criminals without having to go through the proper legal channels.
As a society we have become almost blindly trusting of the companies that provide us with the technological services we crave and depend on for day to day life. Even car companies such as Tesla log every turn, break, and acceleration your Tesla vehicle makes. Is it wrong to want more anonymity or is it impossible in this day and time? I believe that as the IoT (Internet of Things) becomes more intrenched into our lives it is unavoidable that we will be giving up more and more of our privacy for convenience. We are still in the early age of big data and privacy controls cannot keep up with the growing demand for more information about every user. While many companies have tightened up their privacy policies and use of customer data there is a long way to go before we will truly be able to have the right to be forgotten.
Seth Houts
Seth Houts 