Protecting a new right
So AOL has had a management shakeup over the disclosure of potentially personalizable search activity data by 650,000 members. Apparently, a few staff members were canned, but more importantly, the media giant's chief technology officer has left under a cloud.
What fascinates me about these data-privacy battles--which, as Net veterans know, have surfaced now and again for years--is the extent to which they are a new societal issue. While massive offline databases have been on the fringes of consumer consciousness for decades, never before has there been such an organized resistance to the aggregation and disclosure of personal data. But then again, there's never been such a massive amount of data following us around before.
My grandmother, for example, didn't have to give personally-identifiable digital information a thought. When she applied for a loan in the 1940s, there were no credit databases; from what she told me, all she needed a handshake and proof that she was working. No dragging around the albatross of a (potentially misleading or incorrect) credit report.
My mom, for her part, may have needed to have a clean credit report when she got her first home mortgage, but I doubt that she had reason to be afraid that her personal medical or shopping history would become part of public discourse. At the very least, she didn't have to worry about the data ending up on the Internet, freely distributed for any yahoo to drool over--or use as the basis to sell her designer pharmaceuticals.
My generation, though, has everything to worry about when it comes to dispersed digital identitities. For us, it's become a core value to fight the aggregation of data, and particularly, the distribution of personal data in the public marketplace. Folks like me that grew into middle age as the Web emerged know in our bones that this medium can destroy us just by "knowing" too much about us. It's not even that we've done anything we're ashamed of; we just don't want to be pawed over. So we fight, instinctively, for a right to digital privacy our parents and grandparents never knew existed.
When I was a child experimenting with primitive computing, I never imagined the day in which it wouldn't be an unqualified friend and tool. But the reality is, the downside of digital technology is living through mind-boggling expansions of its reach...especially its power to expose us to the elements. And believe me, being profiled as part of the raucous, bored, redneck-friendly AOL public square is a fate I'd particularly like to avoid.
What fascinates me about these data-privacy battles--which, as Net veterans know, have surfaced now and again for years--is the extent to which they are a new societal issue. While massive offline databases have been on the fringes of consumer consciousness for decades, never before has there been such an organized resistance to the aggregation and disclosure of personal data. But then again, there's never been such a massive amount of data following us around before.
My grandmother, for example, didn't have to give personally-identifiable digital information a thought. When she applied for a loan in the 1940s, there were no credit databases; from what she told me, all she needed a handshake and proof that she was working. No dragging around the albatross of a (potentially misleading or incorrect) credit report.
My mom, for her part, may have needed to have a clean credit report when she got her first home mortgage, but I doubt that she had reason to be afraid that her personal medical or shopping history would become part of public discourse. At the very least, she didn't have to worry about the data ending up on the Internet, freely distributed for any yahoo to drool over--or use as the basis to sell her designer pharmaceuticals.
My generation, though, has everything to worry about when it comes to dispersed digital identitities. For us, it's become a core value to fight the aggregation of data, and particularly, the distribution of personal data in the public marketplace. Folks like me that grew into middle age as the Web emerged know in our bones that this medium can destroy us just by "knowing" too much about us. It's not even that we've done anything we're ashamed of; we just don't want to be pawed over. So we fight, instinctively, for a right to digital privacy our parents and grandparents never knew existed.
When I was a child experimenting with primitive computing, I never imagined the day in which it wouldn't be an unqualified friend and tool. But the reality is, the downside of digital technology is living through mind-boggling expansions of its reach...especially its power to expose us to the elements. And believe me, being profiled as part of the raucous, bored, redneck-friendly AOL public square is a fate I'd particularly like to avoid.
posted by Anne Zieger at 5:56 AM
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