| "I have to blame the consumers, not developers" I'm the opposite to you, I blame developers. They are the ones who build and understand the tech that powers online tracking. If a user switches from their Google account to a non-related Google website, how are they to know they are stealthily still being tracked thanks to an invisible bit of Google Analytics code? Do the consumers who purchase a ChromeBook realise everything they do in the OS is tracked and recorded by Google (even simply printing to their desktop printer)? Are the parents of school children aware of the privacy implications of their kids using ChromeOS in the classroom? ChromeBooks are becoming ubiquitous in US classrooms, and yet there's barely any discussion of the privacy aspects. Even if these companies assure us they only aggregate the data they collect (never personally identifying individuals), that's still a frighteningly large volume of personal information they capture. Can you imagine the humongous volume of aggregated data that Google must hold on it's users? They probably have the ability to mine that data in ways that most us probably can't even imagine. What do developers do about this? Nothing. They built this tech and few ever call out these companies on their behaviour. In fact, a great many rush to the defence of these companies and happily recommend their products ("just bought my mom a Chromebook!"). So no, I don't think it's fair to blame consumers, but yes you can certainly blame developers. |