Research Paper Example about Internet Privacy

The Digital Age has revolutionized the way we communicate and connect with one another, paved the way for technological innovation, and reshaped consumer culture within the United States over the past two decades. The Digital Age has also made consumer privacy an invaluable commodity. To begin my investigation into how exactly our data and privacy is leveraged by online entities for practices such as targeted advertising as well as the effects of these practices on our understanding of our data as well as aspects of American society as a whole, I believe it is best to first outline what exactly privacy is. As defined in “Thinking About Privacy: Engaging Privacy and Information Technology in a Digital Age,” privacy involves “reference to the types of information available about an individual, whether they are primary or derived from analysis. These types of information include behavioral, financial, medical, biometric, consumer, and biographical. Privacy interests also attach to the gathering, control, protection, and use of information about individuals.” With this understanding of privacy in mind, it is easy to recognize that privacy and data form the foundation of digital interactions. Online commerce, communication, and connections are fueled by an ongoing, and nearly constant, cycle of data collection. As a result, a sentiment of comfort over privacy has gradually become more commonplace within American society as our lives and interactions have shifted online. In addition, negative patterns of behavior within a variety of user age groups have also coincided with the rise of directed user data collection practices. Can trends pertaining to worsening health standards, attitudes towards personal privacy online, and political collusion be attributed to current-day online data collection and advertising practices? If so, just how much power does our data hold in regards to societal consequences, and how can we bridge the gap between online entities and their users? At the heart of my investigation, I would like to find the point at which commodification of user data becomes more of a commodification of the individual and the effects that this practice has had on American society as a whole.

The types of data that I will be looking at in my investigation generally pertain to personally identifiable information, or PII. In a majority of studies that I will be referring to, the data at their focus mainly includes online users’ ages, online purchases, and general media and website interactions. For example, in the case of the Cambridge Analytica scandal, it has been said that over 5,000 data points were built on 230,000,000 American adults using personal data such as “online purchases, voting results, and more” (User Data Privacy: Facebook, Cambridge Analytica, and Privacy Protection | IEEE Journals & Magazine | IEEE Xplore). Information such as this can give insight into just how effective Big Data can be in influencing societal change. The case of Cambridge Analytica builds on this further, as it proves that even a single data collection company can wield an immense amount of power when it comes to repurposing data for targeted advertising. Although Cambridge Analytica most likely did not completely decide the conclusion of the United States’ 2016 Presidential Election, its online targeting of potential voters through dubious data collection practices gained enough traction to at least somewhat affect the events of the election. Beyond this, it also presented Americans with a wake-up call regarding the significance of online data and privacy; the response elicited from Cambridge Analytica displays the effects of viewing online privacy and data collection as trivial trade-offs for digital comfort. Data is powerful, and it is only becoming more significant to our daily lives as our daily interactions are shifted online. 

If data-wielding has the potential to affect the American political sphere, what does this mean for other aspects of society? In a 2018 case study titled “What's on YouTube? A Case Study on Food and Beverage Advertising in Videos Targeted at Children on Social Media,” writers LeeAnn Tan, See Hoe Ng, Azahadi Omar, and Tilakavati Karupaiah analyzed the amount of advertisements that appeared on the 25 most popular YouTube channels directed at children. The channels’ content ranged from toy unboxings to nursery rhymes and family vlogs, and each channel’s 25 most popular videos were viewed and recorded in order to determine how many ads involving “noncore,” or excessively unhealthy, foods were displayed. The team found that their study “revealed that food and beverage ads appeared most frequently (reflecting overall trends in television ads), with more than half of these promoting noncore or unhealthy foods'' and that “[u]nhealthy food ads were to a greater extent delivered via more enticing ad formats compared to ads for other foods.” (What's on YouTube? A Case Study on Food and Beverage Advertising in Videos Targeted at Children on Social Media | Childhood Obesity (liebertpub.com)) The fact that this conclusion was found in regards to content that was specifically tagged under ‘Kids’ shows just how invasive and premeditated targeted advertising can be. As the United States faces a steadily increasing youth obesity rate of 17.2 percent (Overweight & Obesity Statistics | NIDDK (nih.gov)), findings such as these can correlate real-world negative trends related to health and eating habits in younger user age groups with themes presented through repetitive advertising practices. If studies investigating the link between increased exposure to food-related television advertising and rising obesity rates have shown a substantial correlation between the two (Fast‐Food Restaurant Advertising on Television and Its Influence on Childhood Obesity | The Journal of Law and Economics: Vol 51, No 4 (uchicago.edu)), then there is no doubt that Internet advertising results in the same conclusion. In fact, online advertising would possibly pose an even greater risk of users developing unhealthy habits as it, as a practice, allows for even more personalized marketing due to the availability and abundance of individualized data. Rather than relying on general trends that reflect behaviors of an age group as a whole and presenting advertising campaigns to a relatively randomized set of viewers, online marketers are able to specifically direct content towards a pre-selected audience made up of viewers who respond and interact with advertisements and content similar to those of said online marketers. For instance, Youtube’s website structure makes it easier for users to be caught within a data cycle of their own creation. YouTube’s content algorithm is constantly adding content to a user’s suggestions and interface based on that user’s previous viewing choices. By creating this feedback loop of preferred content and integrating other pieces of data such as a user’s age bracket, advertisers are able to market directly to their most prosperous audience. 

Similar to the YouTube advertising case study, another study based around e-cigarette use among children and teens due to increased online advertising resulted in a nearly identical conclusion: “The findings from this nationally representative study of US middle and high school students found that e-cigarette advertisement exposure was associated with e-cigarette use, and greater exposure was associated with higher odds of use.” Again, the availability of individual user data on the Internet makes the online sphere an essentially perfect medium for marketing. In terms of privacy, however, can one truly say that users’ privacy is being adequately protected if they are able to be targeted on such a specific, sometimes even individual, scale? Children especially do not have the experience or understanding necessary to consent to these practices, especially when their own data is being extracted and used against them in a way that is potentially negative to their health. When the collection of user data allows corporations and online entities to have this level of power over American political institutions, health trends, and behavioral patterns, I believe that data is being somewhat leveraged against the United States as a whole. But what does this mean for online privacy? By extension, user privacy is essentially being traded off, sometimes without their knowledge or consent, in return for the comfort of “free” online interaction. 

As previously mentioned, the Internet’s ubiquity of digital user data has made corporate influence and marketing campaigns easier than ever. Beyond this though, what exactly are each party’s interests in the matters of online privacy, and more specifically, targeted advertising? Furthermore, how do current attitudes towards Internet privacy affect the targeted advertising and data collection policies of online entities? Regarding competing interests, although it is already well understood that most major online entities pursue practices such as targeted advertising as a means of profit, the interests of online users are much more complicated. The reason this is the case is that, although online privacy has become an increasingly popular topic of discussion over the last decade, many still do not completely understand the value of their data and privacy.