PRIVACY PREDATORS Text by ISHANI RAHA
Art by SAMANTHA HO
TECH COMPANIES FARM AND SELL USER DATA
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CROLLING through her “For how they use the web,” Boneh says. “They You” page on TikTok, Palo Alto then compile all the data they collect into a High School junior Megan Wong recommendation system that lets them impauses to like a video of the newest prove their services and propose user-spedance challenge that has been dominating cific content for people to view.” the app. She halts occasionally, clicking on Today, one does not have to look far to creator profiles and making split-second find media surrounding the data-farming decisions to follow some of them. Howev- controversy. Most notably, in the past six er, beneath the viral dance challenges and months, headlines about various lawsuits comedy skits, everyagainst technology thing — from the videos companies have been she likes to who she fol- We’re not really a constant reminder lows and the comments aware of the risks that everything put she makes — is being online is subject to the tracked and recorded and concerns of somass sale of data. in a form of large-scale cial media, because Younger generdata farming that affects ations are often conwe’re just so engaged sidered extremely all users of the app. This form of user in it. We don’t really tech savvy and capadata collection is not ble when it comes to only a phenomenon of think of the defects.” navigating the digital — ANISHA GANDHI, sophomore TikTok, although the world, so it would U.S. military says it has make sense that they special concerns about the app. As humans are also the most prepared when it comes spend increasing amounts of time on social to their digital safety. But do teens really media, they leave behind traces of person- care whether their information — which in al information, ranging from simply what all regards should stay private — is given to posts they like to their names and birth- massive technology corporations and used dates, and technology companies are able for possibly nefarious purposes? Answers to harness this information to their benefit. surprisingly vary among students, profesCompanies like Facebook and TikTok par- sionals and members of the Palo Alto comticipate in the routine exchange of personal munity. data, which can be bought and sold by dozens of corporations. The flaws of TikTok and Facebook According to Dan Boneh, Stanford TikTok, a video sharing social netUniversity professor in cryptography and working service that has grown exponencomputer security, companies have great tially in the past two years, gives creators influence over user data. the chance to make and share short videos “These companies generally have many to an audience of 500 million users. In reways to track how people use their apps and cent months, TikTok has come under pub-
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lic scrutiny for giving and selling data to the Chinese government: a lawsuit filed in December 2019 accused TikTok of secretly selling user data. In September 2019, the app was also accused of censoring information that went against the ideals of the Chinese government, such as the ongoing protests in Hong Kong. Facebook, too, has had its fair share of lawsuits and attention regarding user data security, the most famous incident being the Cambridge Analytica case. In 2018, the political data firm — hired by presidential candidate Donald Trump’s 2016 election campaign — gained access to information of about 50 million Facebook users. The firm used this data to understand voter preferences and habits, which were exploited with targeted advertisements designed to mass influence voter behavior. It is difficult to gauge the amount of personal data being shuffled around and utilized for user-specific content. California’s Consumer Privacy Act, which went into effect on Jan. 1, is the first step in bringing to light the specifics of data farming. Besides causing an influx of “Changed Terms and Services” notifications on social media sites, the act aims to increase transparency on how data is used, and has been called a “victory for consumer privacy rights” by the media. “The [privacy] law sets some boundaries on how platforms can share user data with other entities,” Boneh says. “It also requires platforms to notify users on how their data will be used.” Though many believe the law, which is modeled after the European Union’s General Data Protection Regulation, is a step