After watching all six TED Talks regarding the idea of both online and offline privacy, I no longer feel as if any information in my life is private. Our world today is based around new technological advancements, social media platforms, texting, calling, dating online, etc. Everything that we do on our smartphones is tracked and stored forever and just as Andy Yen explained that "we have lost our privacy and the idea of privacy," everything we do is shared online and nothing is private anymore.
Online privacy issues affect both my family and friends as well. I was lucky enough to grow up with a Dad who was in the Air Force and understood the extent to which the government tracks and stores everyone's information online. I was always given knowledge with how to protect myself online such as never sending a w9 form through email because it contains my social security number. As well as allowing apps to have my location because they can track my day to day life. This goes along with Catherine Crump's TED Talk, giving scary information on location tracking based on our license plates. The police are able to track each plate surrounding the technology attached to their car. This was only meant to track the actions of people on watch that had suspicious activity. However, information discovered that they were tracking everyone. I agree with Catherine Crump's point that this "uses and abuses the technology." The government does not need to keep and store information of every innocent human's daily life and activities.
The government will not do anything regarding digital privacy issues because they are aware of how much money big corporations are making from gaining our personal information on sites and cookies to target our demographics, wants, needs, and likes through advertisements. As Andy Yen explained this issue, he warns us that there was 137 billion dollars of revenue from Yahoo, Google, and Facebook advertising in 2014. Almost 10 years ago, imagine how the revue has most likely doubled since then. The government understands the profit that advertising reels in, which is why they will not address the real issue at hand.
We can protect ourselves from invasions online by being conscious of the information we allow and send online. I have been taught platforms from my family that can help protect this information from being taken. These include the web browser DuckDuckGo, which does not store any personal data. Signal messenger is a safer option than Whats App due to the encryption system. These are just a few of the simple and smart steps we can take to protect our personal privacy online.
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