Data privacy is all the rage and people want to have an internet where companies need permission to sell your data and where you can use the FREE service without letting them tell advertisers what you actually like.

There are only 2 possible models for the internet

  1. A free internet where websites, browsers and search engines make money by selling your data to companies who want to sell their products to users.

  2. A subscription based internet where you companies don’t use your data but charge a fee to use a specific website, browser or search engine.

I can guarantee that all these people complaining about “muh privacy” would not like having a paywall restricted internet.

  • lmmarsano@lemmynsfw.comEnglish
    1·
    1 day ago

    I don’t know, man. I assume they have information they may find in a phonebook; data I voluntarily gave social media & networking such as my school or employment, demographics, relations, peers, & whatever they can glean from peers; my shopping preferences; rough geolocation from my IP address; my ISP, OS, web browser, content I’ve browsed. None of this information is particularly valuable to me. It would take incredible effort for me to code & host a search engine or social media site or the various other free web applications I use. I value those way more than my junk data that is worthless to me, so the trade-off is obvious.

    The government has access to much more sensitive information about me: social security; government issued licenses & registrations; birth, education, tax, property, police, medical, telecommunication, financial records. Only the law & procedure prevents it from abusing that access.

    Without online data brokers, anyone could gather much of the same, less sensitive information about me though plain observation, public surveillance, or interviews: only time & effort discourages them. Seems like a lack of perspective.