When Max Schrems asked Facebook to hand over all the data the company had, he expected it to be a large file.
But the Austrian law student was unprepared for the 1,200-page tome he received, detailing all of his friend requests, event invitations, social media messages and comments.
The disclosure, which occurred more than a decade ago, exposed the extent of Facebook's data collection efforts. The practice allowed founder Mark Zuckerberg to target users with hyper-personalized ads, generating nearly $115 billion in ad revenue last year alone.
Zuckerberg pioneered and perfected this method of making money online. , which is called “surveillance capitalism”. Companies collect massive amounts of data on people to predict what and when they will want to buy, sending them advertisements for products and services and scratching their itch.
Other companies such as Amazon, Google, and now TikTok have also benefited greatly from this business model.
But could Zuckerberg now be the one to stop data collection ?
Meta is preparing to give European users ad-free access to Instagram as long as they shell out £11 every month. TikTok is also testing an ad-free model outside the U.S.
The moves suggest tech companies could use a subscription model rather than advertising. This shift means that users will become customers, rather than repositories of data to be sifted through in search of information.
The shift reflects growing concerns about what companies now know about people, as well as a tougher stance from regulators towards big tech companies.
“There is a renewed awareness that privacy is important — I think we started to forget about it,” says Sandra Wachter, professor of technology and regulation at the Oxford Internet Institute.
Zuckerberg said in 2010 that privacy was no longer a “social norm,” insisting that people now happy to pass on your personal information.
“People have really become comfortable with not only sharing more information and different kinds of information, but more openly and with more people,” the then 25-year-old tech whiz said.
He spoke at the time Facebook, now six years old, was still something of a novelty that millions wanted to experiment with.
However, doubts about sharing information online have grown recently.
A survey by consumer group Which? in August it was revealed that almost 60% of UK consumers do not trust social media companies. The same number said they were concerned about how their data was collected and used by businesses.
Consumer concerns about data privacy have been fueled by public outrage such as the Cambridge Analytica scandal and eerily targeted advertising campaigns.
p> 
Meta Mark Zuckerberg has perfected the method of «surveillance capitalism» to make money online. Photo: JOSH EDELSON/AFP
Inevitably, the deterioration in public sentiment has attracted the attention of regulators. Earlier this year, Brussels imposed a record €1.2 billion fine on Meta for violating data privacy rules after the company moved European user data to servers in the US.
In an even bigger blow, the EU's top court this summer overturned a landmark ruling that threatened Meta's ability to continue tracking users without their consent.
Facebook and Instagram users in Europe can now block Meta from collecting huge amounts of their data by limiting ad targeting to only vague information such as age, location and gender.
Niamh Burns of Enders Analysis says: «Meta wouldn't be doing this if regulators weren't pushing them.»
Could this be the beginning of the end of surveillance capitalism?
Industry observers are not convinced. . Meta, which earned more than $25 billion from advertising in Europe last year, naturally won't want to give up this business model.
According to experts, Meta's actions are nothing more than an attempt to circumvent legal issues and appease regulators.
Luke Dixon, a partner at law firm Freeths, says Meta and its lawyers have been “very smart” in proposing an alternative business model that allows the company to circumvent the EU court ruling.
“They say either people agree for personalized advertising targeted at them when they use our service, or they can still use it, but we have to pay for it,” he says. “I think they've found a potential path.”
What's even more telling is that it's far from clear that consumers are willing to accept a subscription.
Some companies, such as Netflix and Disney, have managed to convert viewers into paying subscribers. But companies like Instagram and TikTok, whose platforms thrive on ephemeral user-generated content, will find it harder to charge for their services, not least during a cost-of-living crisis.
As Christine Rannegar, senior director, says on Internet Trust at the Internet Society: «Seriously, is watching people's food photos the same as streaming a Disney catalog?»
“There's a really big difference because streaming services provide content to users, and many of them actually create their own movies and TV shows, whereas social networks get content from users.”
Other attempts to put social networks behind a paywall access were unsuccessful. Elon Musk's attempts to charge users of X, formerly known as Twitter, £11 per blue tick have had limited success.
Meanwhile, Neeva, an ad-free, privacy-focused search engine that was once seen as a Google competitor, shut down in May.
Burns agrees that people should pay to view user-generated posts. services that have always been free are a «hard sell.»
She says: «Very few users choose to pay just for no advertising — certainly not enough to make an impact compared to this huge ad revenue «.
Richard Windsor, a technology analyst, adds that Meta's new subscription is simply too expensive and «appears deliberately priced out, creating a strong incentive for EU users to explicitly allow targeted advertising.»
Some privacy campaigners are concerned that that Meta's new product sets a dangerous precedent. This suggests that consumers should pay for their right to privacy.
Professor Wachter says: «The question is, is it actually acceptable to pay to protect your privacy, even if it is a human right?»
She believes tech giants risk creating a new digital divide between those who can afford to protect their privacy and those who cannot.
“What We Shouldn't to do is to equate people's interests and desire for privacy with their financial means to pay,” she says.
Rannegar puts it more bluntly: “Europeans should be outraged that a media service wants to charge them to opt out of personalized advertising.”
The debate over data collection comes amid the rapid emergence of artificial intelligence, which opens up new ways for tech companies to make money from user data.
Meta's vast amount of user information gives it an advantage in changing artificial intelligence models to personalize ads. Photo: JOSH EDELSON/AFP
With its vast amount of user data, Meta is in a better position to train artificial intelligence models. to further personalize advertising. The technology can also be used to plan campaigns and predict audience behavior.
Industry body Warc estimates that AI-powered targeting innovations will help boost Instagram's global advertising revenue by a quarter to $74 billion in 2024 year.
p>
The riches on offer suggest that the current cooldown in personalized advertising may only be a temporary lull. Data collection is likely to continue, to the disappointment of people like Professor Wachter.
“Nobody is saying, 'Why do you care about your property rights?' Why do you care about your right not to be tortured?,” she says. “Privacy is the one human right we must constantly protect.”
Свежие комментарии