Privacy. It Matters

Recently, Trump has repealed President Obama’s privacy laws that protect peoples data. Now why is this important? This protection was put into place to prevent internet service providers or ISP’s from selling what you do online to the highest bidder. How does this affect someone? It effects everything you do, search for, buy, sell, look at online. Your data becomes a data cluster which can be sold to businesses. You no longer become a person but just a data cluster. You are probably thinking “what can’t the ISP’s collect, what about my social security, credit card.” Well…they can also collect this without your knowledge.

“But what if I don’t care what they collect.” I often hear this a lot from people who are complacent with their data being given away. I find this an issue. I look at what this might lead to. You might consider me crazy. But I do believe this massive data collection could and might eventually lead to pre-crime. For example, if your data is out there in the open, what would stop the government from looking at it and checking and seeing and making assumptions on someone if their data fell within to a certain behavioral matrix. Wouldn’t this be kicking the constitution in the face? It does seem like unlawful search and seizure of data.

Data might not be physical, but it is a person’s possession. It can feel like a huge invasion of privacy if it is taken and sold with out someone’s knowledge. Awhile back, 60 minutes  did a special on data brokers. It isn’t about what you know that is being collected, but what you don’t know that is being collected.

“You are not longer an individual. You are a data cluster bound to a vast global network.” – watch dogs

A counter point I hear about this whole privacy issue, is “well Facebook and Google collect my data. So why does it matter? ” You volunteer to surrender some data, but some companies are allowing you to say “no” to collecting data. More and more companies are becoming a little more transparent, such as Microsoft’s next Windows 10 update. Still the difference between Facebook and ISP’s, is that you get many choices in your social network. However, to access the internet, you might literally have 1 option and 1 option alone. You get two choices, either stay offline or risk your data being collected. After all, a majority of companies are moving their stuff to online only, which would hinder some users from actually being able to pay their bills. So its a tough thing to say if you only have 1 ISP provider in the area.

Why would the government repeal protections from their voters? Simple follow the money, see which providers are paying to Congress and you will learn quickly who is on whose side these days.

IN CLOSING

What can you do to protect your privacy when it comes to a ISP since they control the flow to the internet? Well you can use a VPN with a browser like brave. Or set up a raspberry pi tool that automatically helps secure your internet further.

see you space cowboy…

source :Motherboard