I'm being watched — and I don't care
Steve LeVine
Axios
Tech companies in the surveillance game are betting hard on one thing: that consumers — especially younger ones — won't care too much what you know about them as long as you give them really cool stuff.
I would know — I’m one of them, writes Erica.
The big picture: Per a February IBM survey, 71% of consumers say it's worth sacrificing privacy for the benefits of technology.
- A whopping 81% say they're concerned about how their data is used. But only 45% have actually updated privacy settings in the last year, and a measly 16% have stopped using a tech company's service because of data misuse.
-- According to an Axios/Survey Monkey poll, 46% of consumers aged 18–24 always accept a company's privacy policies without reading a single word. Only 15% of those over 65 do the same. Why it matters: This is why surveillance capitalism has boomed. I — like scores of others — have decided that I'm OK with giving up personal data in order to keep getting convenient, cheap (or free) services. Despite the known episodes of firms misusing data, the ease and quality of life under the reign of Big Tech generally seems worth it.
-- On top of that, despite the public techlash, many of the companies at the pinnacle of data capitalism — Amazon, Microsoft and Google — are among the most trusted institutions in the country.
-- Consumers' big gamble is that companies won't do anything untoward with their personal information. Zuboff's book misses this, author Nicholas Carr wrote in the LA Review of Books:
"Many people, it seems clear, experience surveillance capitalism less as a prison, where their agency is restricted in a noxious way, than as an all-inclusive resort, where their agency is restricted in a pleasing way."Two weeks ago, while in Seattle, I visited my first Amazon Go store. The small, seemingly harmless shop's capabilities for snooping are immense.
-- It knows exactly how I moved about the store, what items I bought together and when I bought them.
-- Amazon can combine that with my online shopping, watching and listening habits through Amazon Prime and Alexa. But when it comes to Go — or Instagram or Uber — I just don't care. As a friend put it, "Take my data; give me free shit."
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