[throw2016]

If anyone is convinced what they are doing is good for end users they would let them make the choice. But expending time and energy to design and code deceptive dialogs with misinformation and avoid transparency betrays the opposite. You don't need an ethics course for this, it's willful fraud and deception.

Our societies are shaped as much by technology as by the incessant greed of a few often couched in euphemisms like 'innovation' and 'drive' to justify their value but these only accrue to a few. Behavioral targeting and surveillance have negative externalities for everyone not making money from it, and even for them in the wider societal and long term context.

If this is the behavior we are incentivizing then either we provide strong regulations to counter greedy and unethical behavior or accept these as our fundamental driving values without fabricating a 'feel good' alternative reality as a fig leaf or feigning shock at mercenaries in our midst.