There is no simple answer to the Internet privacy solution, but lately the news media has been kicking up a storm regarding the repeal of the Obama era privacy laws.
Lets take a look at what is going on in the realm of Internet privacy and I will give you some good options to protect yourself if you deem it necessary.
How many people did you say?
You are just 1 of 3,200,000,000. Yes you read that correctly there are over 3.2 billion people on the Internet across the entire world. You are just one bit in the world of terabytes upon terabytes of people. Does any one marketer care about you specifically, not exactly. Most of the time your ISP and other Internet companies are compiling data in batches to analyze trends. Maybe count the number of Netflix subscribers, or the number of YouTube videos watched. However more recently we have been seeing increasingly targeted campaigns at specific groups users. Is this a breach of your privacy?
Was the Obama law repealed?
Yes and no. The new FCC rules would have given consumers greater control
over what their internet service provider can do with their data by requiring them to get permission from customers before using their information to create targeted advertisements. However, the rules were never in effect. So basically we repealed a law that never happened anyway. Its business as usual. The controversy of the law stems from different standards for the ISP (like Verizon, Comcast, Cox, Spectrum etc) and other websites like Google and Facebook. In other words the law would force the Verizon and others to obtain consumer permissions to track and sites like Google would not need consent giving them an unfair advantage. Continue reading “Internet Privacy – Should you care? Is VPN the answer?”