The researchers believed that the ease of “microtargeting” campaigns to specific user data accounted for the fact that 96,000 of the companies listed were only targeting one of the volunteers.
One person, being tracked by at least 96,000 companies. WTF?
A good reminder that privacy may only exist now because the sheer volume of information is so large that it provides anonymity through overload.
Nothing really too weird about that. A countries entire infrastructure is run by millions of people just for each individual to live through society.
Is that not the problem? That there’s “nothing weird” about how highly focused companies are getting about us as people?
Last time i checked neither my water company, nor my electricity company, nor the supermarkets where i buy food, had followed me around or inquired about more than what was necessary to exchange goods for money.
I saw a Youtube video a while ago on how supermarket chains create customer profiles for each credit card. That way, they can get a better understanding of purchasing habits and how consumers react to price changes. Makes finding the most profitable price easy, you see.
In the US. In the EU that is illegal. That is why they offer voluntary bonus programs, where the data collection is explicitly allowed by the customer. Unlike facebook it is not necessary for the servicevthough and also they dont sell the data to third parties.
That’s the case here in Canada, and on top of that it was revealed a year ago that many stores were secretly sending in-person/brick-and-mortar purchase data directly to Facebook/Meta without notifying anyone. Because they get a kickback or something, iirc. (I have to check again but I’m pretty sure that even applies if you have no FB account.)
edit to add source: https://www.cbc.ca/news/business/retailers-sharing-data-meta-1.6737484
