Worldwide the number of privacy regulations is growing. Gartner predicts that by the end of 2024 the personal data of about 75 percent of the world’s population will be protected by privacy regulations.
However, many large data gathering companies are still ignoring these privacy laws, such as the Promotion of Access to Information Act (PAIA 2 of 2000) in South Africa.
For instance, a recent Gartner survey found that 40% of organisations had an Artificial Intelligence (AI) breach of which 10 percent was malicious.
The problem is that the processing of data through AI-based technology integrated into a vendor offering has inherent risks to privacy and could lead to the misuse of personal data.
Quite often the embedded AI capabilities are used to track employee behaviour, assess consumer sentiment and build “smart” products that learn by means of machine learning.
As we settled into a hybrid model of work and engagement during and after the Covid-19 pandemic, the need for tracking, monitoring, and personal data processing increased and so did the risk to privacy.
One company that seems to constantly circumvent the privacy laws, is Google. Google is one of the major technology companies, together with Facebook, Pinterest, TikTok, YouTube, and numerous others that track users to enable targeted advertising.
It is thus quite possible that the following scenario may happen to us in real life: You are hungry and call Pizza World to order a pizza...
CALLER:“Good afternoon, is this Pizza World?”
GOOGLE: “Good afternoon sir. No it’s Google Pizza.”
CALLER: “I must have dialled the wrong number. My apologies.”
GOOGLE: “No sir, Google acquired Pizza World three months ago.”
CALLER:“Okay, then I would like to order a pizza, please.”
GOOGLE: “Do you want your usual pizza, sir?”
CALLER:“My usual? What do you mean? Do you know me then?”
GOOGLE: “According to our caller identification database, the past 12 times you called you ordered an extra-large Four Seasons pizza with four cheeses, salami, pepperoni, ham and Italian sausage on a thick crust.”
CALLER:“Great! That’s exactly what I’ll have.”
GOOGLE: “May I suggest that this time you order a pizza with ricotta, baby arugula, garlic, sun-dried tomatoes and black olives on a wholewheat gluten-free thin crust?”
CALLER: “What? I don’t want a vegetarian pizza!”
GOOGLE: Sir, your cholesterol and triglyceride counts are not good.”
CALLER: “How do you know that?”
GOOGLE: “Well, we cross-referenced your home phone number with your medical records. We have the result of your blood tests for the last seven years.”
CALLER: “Okay, but I do not want your rotten vegetarian pizza! I am already taking a fibrate and a statin for my cholesterol.”
GOOGLE: “Excuse me sir, but you have not taken your medication regularly. According to our database, you only once purchased 30 fibrate and 30 statin tablets at Discount Pharmacy, three months ago.”
CALLER: “I bought more from another pharmacy.”
GOOGLE: “Sir, that doesn’t show on your credit card statement.”
CALLER: “I paid in cash.”
GOOGLE: “But Sir, you did not withdraw enough cash according to your bank statement.”
CALLER: “I have other sources of cash.”
GOOGLE: “Sir, that doesn’t show on your latest tax returns, unless you bought them using an undeclared income source, which is against the law!”
CALLER: “What the heck!!!”
GOOGLE: “I’m sorry sir, we use such information only with the sole intention of improving our service to you.”
CALLER: “Enough, enough! I’m sick to death of Google, Facebook, Twitter, WhatsApp and all the social media constantly watching me. I’m going to an island without the internet, television, and smartphone so that no one can watch me or spy on me.”
GOOGLE: “I understand sir, but you need to renew your passport first. It expired one month ago...”
This conversation may be disconcerting, but is quite feasible with the amount of personal data gathered by companies. Recently, a group of more than 40 Democrat members of Congress in the US demanded that Google stop collecting and storing “unnecessary” location data because they are concerned that it could be used by certain states to identify women seeking abortions.
This demand came since the Roe versus Wade legal case of 1973 that guaranteed a person’s constitutional right to abortion, was reversed by the Supreme Court in the US. Certain US states where abortion is banned could use location data, search histories, and period-tracking app data against women seeking abortions.
Google responded by promising that they will in future delete visits to abortions clinics, domestic violence shelters, weight loss clinics, and other sensitive locations from users’ location histories soon after their systems identified that a trip was made to one of these locations.
It is a well-known fact that Google stores historical location information about smartphone users, which is often shared with other companies and government agencies.
Surveillance has thus become an important approach for the police to enforce laws. In South Africa, according to reports, the Hawks used geofencing or “reverse location” social media data to identify instigators and organisers of the July 2021 insurrection, violence and looting. In the past this practice has unfortunately often led to innocent spectators or by-passers being wrongfully arrested. This is why New York State banned the use of geofence warrants by law enforcement since the introduction of the Reverse Location Search Prohibition Act.
For many year’s Google has been tracking users. If a person uses Google’s apps on their smartphone, there is a good chance that they are being tracked. Even if the Google account’s location history is disabled, some Google apps could still be storing location data. For example, if you open Google Maps or Waze, or use Google search on any platform, it logs your location with a timestamp.
When Apple introduced new privacy measures last year, Google followed suit. But one type of internet tracking was just replaced by another. For many years, digital businesses relied on “third party” or cross-app tracking. Companies such as Google and Facebook used technology to track people on the internet. If a person visited an online car dealer, the information is used for targeted advertising on other sites that the person visits.
However, Apple and also Google, are blocking this kind of invasive tracking to protect people’s privacy by allowing them to switch off the tracking by different apps. But tracking has just shifted to “first party” tracking. People are not trailed from app to app or site to site anymore, but companies are still gathering information on what people are looking at, although with the user’s consent. Google, Pinterest, TikTok and YouTube are all gathering data on its own users.
There is a way to ensure that Google is not tracking you, but it entails the changing of several settings in your Google Account. It also has the drawback that the online experience will not be ultra-personalised and ads will be less relevant. And even then you cannot be totally sure you are not tracked.
But do people really want targeted advertising based on the tracking of their online behaviour? Apparently not. In 2021 a massive 94 percent of Apple users indicated that they rather prefer not to share their data and thus do not care to receive targeted ads. It seems that people either do not trust digital advertising or they find it so intrusive that they prefer not to be exposed to it.
Marketers and digital companies may love ad tracking, but customers certainly do not. But Google and Facebook had to change the way they operate many times before. Whatever the new solutions for preserving privacy while also running ads to ensure income, it’s likely that marketers will still find a way to flourish because… that is what they do! This unfortunately means we will still be tracked, profiled and targeted in future, even when location tracking has been switched off. And do not forget the detailed tracking by your Fitbit or smart-watch.
Professor Louis C H Fourie Extraordinary Professor University of the Western Cape
BUSINESS REPORT