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Privacy Updates
Privacy Updates
With the recent controversies surrounding internet privacy being brought to the public eye, many internet companies have made changes to their privacy policies that were deemed lacking by the recent F8 security conference.
The focus of these policies is information, and how much of it these companies can discernibly access from its users. A popular company argument against privacy reform is that users should understand what they are signing up for, but instead choose to scroll to the bottom of any given Terms and Conditions of Agreement and check a box without actually reading any of it.
Regardless, the theme of these policy changes is transparency, despite the available terms and conditions. Internet companies must make it so that users can view their settings and data output at any moment, in order to keep users up-to-date with how their information is being used, or enable them to change this usage.
Taking Advantage of the Situation
Taking Advantage of the Situation
Below is an example of a banner ad used by smaller internet companies, such as the search engine DuckDuckGo, taking advantage of the controversy surrounding large companies such as Google.
Internet users who feel violated by companies such as Facebook and Google are more likely to make a switch to another service, making these advertisements an effective business tactic.
This ad popped up during research concerning privacy issues surrounding large internet companies. Even then, we were being shown ads relevant to our search history. Spooky.
CubeYou
CubeYou
For years, the company CubeYou made a business out of personal data on Facebook. The company had nearly unrestricted access to Facebook users’ information, which it gathered up through quizzes and later sold back as reports to clients.
Facebook cut off CubeYou after the backlash that took place a few weeks prior, where the public was enraged at Facebook for not protecting their privacy. Facebook announced that CubeYou misled users, leading them to believe that their quizzes would be used for academic research. In actuality, the company sold this information to marketers.
Federico Treu (right), the Chief Executive of CubeYou, commented on these accusations, stating, “Facebook threw us under the bus...Facebook became what it was because of us developers. Now they want to blame us for everything that has happened to them.”
Treu claims that his company did nothing wrong, and that CubeYou was following Facebook rules in disclosing that it was using profile data for both academic and BUSINESS purposes. Says they are a part of a “witch hunt."
These overall policy shifts have created an unintended domino effect on many of the companies and programmers that relied on data from Facebook for their business (Tinder, Pod, Job Fusion).
The overall question remains the same:
The overall question remains the same:
How much user information should stay private, and how much user information can be rightfully sold?
How much user information should stay private, and how much user information can be rightfully sold?
User information is the main means of income for these internet companies. They may deny this fact, but a majority of their revenue comes from the networks they form, analyzing user data to create a "facilitated user experience."
Works Cited
1. Collins, Katie. “Google Makes Its Privacy Policy Clearer than Ever to Comply with EU Law.” CNET, CNET, 11 May 2018, www.cnet.com/news/google-makes-privacy-policy-clearer-than-ever-to-comply-with-eu-gdpr-law/.
2. Frenkel, Sheera. “Facebook's Privacy Changes Leave Developers Steaming.” The New York Times, The New York Times, 30 Apr. 2018, www.nytimes.com/2018/04/30/technology/facebook-privacy-developers.html.
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