The old days are no match to privacy compared with today’s digitised world. It is true that advancing in technology provided convenient ways for entertainment such as watching a particular show interactively or quick access to published information with just a fingers snap. However; these benefits are not as free as you expect, and the cost is actually your privacy.
Why Privacy is Important?
Many societies including Australia consider privacy as a basic human right. This news is not good for social networking sites such as Facebook or google because they generate much of their profits from the advertising services. The online advertising services rely very much on personal data. In fact, the more privacy issues come to public attention the harder it becomes for online platforms to stabilize their profits because these issues impact many complex sides that make digital advertising work and that’s when advertisers become reluctant to use these platforms.
Online users have a relatively common privacy expectation when they share personal data within online platforms. The consequences of failing to meet these simple needs include a loss of trust, users, investors, and damage to reputation. It is important to note that most of today’s privacy regulations impose massive fines that is up to 20€ million or 4% of the platform’s annual turnover as regulated by The General Data Protection Regulations (GDPR).
So Why is Privacy Becoming a Big Deal?
Tthat’s because the effect of processing personal data can have a tremendous impact offline that sometimes collide with ethical standards such as analyzing the behaviour of a certain group to manipulate their political opinion such as the US 2016 campaign or controlling polls as claimed to be the main reason that shaped the Brexit polls. These actions are considered by individuals as an attempt to alter the course of democracy.
Who is to Blame?
The answer to this question can be surprising because both platforms and users are to blame. It is due to the fact that users do not pay much effort to protect and control personal data. They often share personal data and may do that without reading the privacy policy or term of service. while platforms often find unethical ways that allows them to use personal data without breaking the law.
However, there are some cases platforms are the ones to blame such as the case of PlayStation Network hacking event in 2011 and that’s because system security advisors were doubting the ability of the Network in protecting stored data in the server, yet little were done by the company to improve the system security.
What Usually Happens After Data Breach?
The ultimate solution of any data breach was an apology by digital platforms’ officials, but that was in the past.
Now many countries are working to implement their own comprehensive privacy regulations such as California CCPA, just like the European privacy regulations. The main principle of privacy laws is to hand over the control to users at many aspects such as giving a simplified consent form or allowing for easy withdrawall of personal data after registration.
Unfortunately, several issues emerged when these regulations were introduced.
While companies argue that such regulations would slow innovation due to the need of personal data to create tailored services, many scholars in communication literatures criticized the capability of these regulations because they do not have much flexibility when applied globally. The reason lies behind their effects which will tackle countries regardless of physical borders.
Christopher Wylie, the former employee who revealed the data abuse by Cambridge Analytica in 2018, says “to be frank, I’m disappointed in a lot of regulatory authorities not because they are not trying… it is just that they didn’t actually have that many powers” and further explained that authorities are not well equipped to handle complex data crimes.
Do We Need More Data Regulations?
Data regulations are not bad because it is important to have laws as a legal ground to deal with data violation, but they themselves may be far from enough. The field of communication for instance offers a variety of data protection models but yet need to be tested online. perhaps we may witness multiple models that help to protect personal data within the next two years.