{"id":3135,"date":"2019-04-08T10:48:04","date_gmt":"2019-04-08T10:48:04","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/staging.elixirrdigital.com\/us\/2019\/04\/08\/tech-giants-are-still-actively-ignoring-users-privacy-rights\/"},"modified":"2025-03-05T16:43:10","modified_gmt":"2025-03-05T16:43:10","slug":"tech-giants-are-still-actively-ignoring-users-privacy-rights","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/staging.elixirrdigital.com\/us\/2019\/04\/08\/tech-giants-are-still-actively-ignoring-users-privacy-rights\/","title":{"rendered":"Tech Giants Are Still Actively Ignoring User\u2019s Privacy Rights"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>In a post-GDPR world, the majority of businesses seem to be improving the way personal data is handled and processed by taking proactive steps in making users\u2019 rights clearer, and being upfront about how collected data is going to be used. Let\u2019s face it, as much as it\u2019s been difficult to come to terms with, I think it\u2019s made us all a bit more honest.<\/p>\n<p>That said, it seems that the tech giants of the world \u2013 those that these laws were arguably designed to impact the most \u2013 seem to be inactive at best, and actively breaking the new rules at worst.\n<\/p>\n<h2>Google<\/h2>\n<p>A couple of months ago, <a href=\"https:\/\/www.bbc.co.uk\/news\/technology-46944696\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Google was fined a record \u20ac50m<\/a> by the French Data Regulator for breaches of the rules and specifically for:<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>Lack of transparency<\/li>\n<li>Inadequate information<\/li>\n<li>Lack of valid consent regarding ads personalisation<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>I was thinking to myself, surely it\u2019s time for Google to take this a bit more seriously\u2026<\/p>\n<p>Yet just a few weeks ago we found that Google <em>\u2018forgot\u2019<\/em> to tell people that they had fitted microphones in their Nest security devices. <em>*Face Palm Emoji*<\/em><\/p>\n<p>Congress have asked for a face-to-face confrontation citing that:<\/p>\n<blockquote><p>\u201cGoogle\u2019s failure to disclose a microphone within its Nest Secure product raises serious questions about its commitment to consumer transparency and disclosure [\u2026]\u201d<\/p><\/blockquote>\n<p>But unfortunately this doesn\u2019t stop with Google\u2026<\/p>\n<h2>None of your Business!<\/h2>\n<p>NOYB (None of Your Business) \u2013 a privacy activist group \u2013 said that they found Amazon, Apple, Spotify and YouTube all allowed people to download a copy of their personal information quickly &amp; easily \u2013 which is a step in the right direction \u2013 but that only some of the data was \u201cintelligible\u201d. Other parts of the data were supplied in a format that could not be understood by people \u2013 effectively breaching GDPR.<\/p>\n<h2>Facebook<\/h2>\n<p>Facebook have made all kinds of promises after the Cambridge Analytica scandal and various data breaches last year. This includes upping their data and security teams to provide more visibility to users, and starting to control the spread of fake news more effectively.<\/p>\n<p>However, this hasn\u2019t stopped the investigators, and it\u2019s now estimated that there are <a href=\"https:\/\/www.itpro.co.uk\/general-data-protection-regulation-gdpr\/33111\/facebook-is-subject-to-10-major-gdpr-investigations\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">10 major GDPR investigations into Facebook and its subsidiaries<\/a>.<\/p>\n<p>This year, <a href=\"https:\/\/www.adweek.com\/programmatic\/facebook-will-roll-out-its-clear-history-tool-this-year\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Facebook will roll out its &#8216;clear history&#8217; tool<\/a>, which will obviously have an impact on advertising. Selfishly, my first thoughts were about it making our targeting pools smaller and the data we can use for advertising purposes less effective. But from a privacy perspective, is this really enough?<\/p>\n<h2>The real problem<\/h2>\n<p>The real problem with privacy is that people aren\u2019t educated (even now) as to how their data is being used. I ran a lecture at the University of Suffolk this week, with Masters level business students. While demoing the Facebook ad platform and showing them how easy it is to identify users by demographics, locations, and interests or behaviour, their gasps were enough to inform me that they have no idea how this stuff works. These are well-educated and driven, experienced professionals, taking an MBA in their own time.<\/p>\n<p>Providing a tool to \u2018clear history\u2019 is not going to have an impact on people that don\u2019t understand what the history is, or what it means to them, or what it allows Facebook or us as advertisers to do.<\/p>\n<h2>The positive angle on data sharing<\/h2>\n<p>My angle on privacy is that I\u2019m happy to give it up if I\u2019m provided a great tool or service that improves my user experience. I\u2019m fully in bed with Google\u2026 I know they have tonnes of my data, but I love that they wake me up earlier if there\u2019s a problem with my commute, they provide me alerts to new restaurants I might be interested in, and that they can turn my living room lights on and off via my voice commands \u2013 all for free!<\/p>\n<p>When I\u2019m presented with ads online, I prefer that they\u2019re relevant to me and for things that I\u2019m interested in, rather than just spammy, irrelevant rubbish!<\/p>\n<p>But I\u2019m in an advantageous position, I work with ads and data and I know what I\u2019m giving up to get those benefits. Most \u2018normal\u2019 people don\u2019t.<\/p>\n<p>In my view, Google, Facebook and other tech giants need to be 100% transparent with their users on this stuff \u2013 show them examples of what happens to their data and explain why, so that they can make an informed decision on whether they want to \u2018clear history\u2019 \u2013 otherwise what\u2019s the point? If people were concerned enough, they wouldn\u2019t use the platforms in the first place.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>In a post-GDPR world, the majority of businesses seem to be improving the way personal data is handled and processed by taking proactive steps in making users\u2019 rights clearer, and&hellip;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":11,"featured_media":2609,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"related_service":[71],"related_industry":[],"class_list":["post-3135","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"acf":[],"card":"<article class=\"wp-component-card wp-component-card--dark wp-component-card--resource wp-component-card--post wp-component-card--full-width            wp-component-card--link js-card-link\n        \">\n            <div class=\"wp-component-card__image\">\n            <img width=\"250\" height=\"250\" src=\"https:\/\/staging.elixirrdigital.com\/us\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/2\/2025\/03\/safe.jpeg\" class=\"attachment-card-1-col size-card-1-col\" alt=\"silver lock\" decoding=\"async\" loading=\"lazy\" srcset=\"https:\/\/staging.elixirrdigital.com\/us\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/2\/2025\/03\/safe.jpeg 250w, https:\/\/staging.elixirrdigital.com\/us\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/2\/2025\/03\/safe-150x150.jpeg 150w, https:\/\/staging.elixirrdigital.com\/us\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/2\/2025\/03\/safe-200x200.jpeg 200w, https:\/\/staging.elixirrdigital.com\/us\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/2\/2025\/03\/safe-80x80.jpeg 80w, https:\/\/staging.elixirrdigital.com\/us\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/2\/2025\/03\/safe-100x100.jpeg 100w, https:\/\/staging.elixirrdigital.com\/us\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/2\/2025\/03\/safe-40x40.jpeg 40w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 250px) 100vw, 250px\" \/>        <\/div>\n        <div class=\"wp-component-card__content\">\n        <div class=\"wp-component-card__content-top\">\n                                                    <p class=\"wp-component-card__eyebrow\">\n                    Blog                <\/p>\n                        <a href='https:\/\/staging.elixirrdigital.com\/us\/2019\/04\/08\/tech-giants-are-still-actively-ignoring-users-privacy-rights\/'>\n        <h2 class='wp-component-card__title'>\n            Tech Giants Are Still Actively Ignoring User\u2019s Privacy Rights\n        <\/h2>\n    <\/a>        <\/div>\n                    <div class=\"wp-component-card__content-bottom\">\n                                    <div class=\"wp-component-card__description wysiwyg\">\n                        In a post-GDPR world, the majority of businesses seem to be improving the way personal data is handled and processed by taking proactive steps in making users\u2019 rights clearer, and&hellip;                    <\/div>\n                                                                    <div class=\"wp-component-card__meta\">\n                                                    <p class=\"wp-component-card__date\">\n                                08 April 2019                            <\/p>\n                                                                            <div class=\"wp-component-card__terms\">\n                                                                                            <div class=\"wp-component-tags__tag\">\n                Privacy            <\/div>\n                                                                                                            <\/div>\n                                            <\/div>\n                                            <\/div>\n            <\/div>\n<\/article>\n","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/staging.elixirrdigital.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3135","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/staging.elixirrdigital.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/staging.elixirrdigital.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/staging.elixirrdigital.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/11"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/staging.elixirrdigital.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=3135"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/staging.elixirrdigital.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3135\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/staging.elixirrdigital.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/2609"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/staging.elixirrdigital.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=3135"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/staging.elixirrdigital.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=3135"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/staging.elixirrdigital.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=3135"},{"taxonomy":"related_service","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/staging.elixirrdigital.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/related_service?post=3135"},{"taxonomy":"related_industry","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/staging.elixirrdigital.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/related_industry?post=3135"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}