3 Surprising Ways You Might Be Giving Away Your Personal Information
All the ways advertisers and others get your data
If you have used the internet at any point in the last 10 years, you’re probably aware that companies are collecting data for advertising purposes. The major players in this market are Google, Facebook, and a handful of startups and small data brokers looking at the new frontiers of data, such as connected appliances and energy grids.
It’s all part of the collection side of the data economy. Targeted advertising requires a high-resolution view of consumer activity in order to build more accurate models for advertisers. While this system of extraction was originally built for advertising, this data is also valuable to the courts, government agencies, and political campaigns.
I will attempt to present a neutral and objective view of these sources of data collection. The only commentary I will make here is that these methods are surprising, by which I mean that the average user of these systems is unlikely to be aware of them.
I feel that “surprise” is an important measuring stick in the data privacy conversation. I don’t think the average person is surprised to learn that Amazon knows their purchase or search history. It may, however, be quite surprising to learn that Alexa…
