The New Digital Normal
Technology is a tool. A tool that can be used for both good and for evil. But how do I use it and in what ways does that affect me?
Over the last few years, technology has had sweeping advancements in our society. Artificial intelligence and facial recognition are two of the largest enhancements we've seen that have very positive aspects but also negative ones.
Giant tech companies like Facebook, Google, Apple, and Amazon also benefit from the government's efforts to collect as much data as possible. That's scary. So how does the data I share (willingly or unwillingly) online affect me and those around me? And how do I know if my relationship with technology is positive or negative?
To examine this, I decided to use the data my phone stores of my daily use of social media apps and the average amount of time I spend per day on my phone. From there, I decided to get as much data from the apps I use most often to see what kind of content I engage with and to see if that engagement affects the ads I see and even my overall mental health. My hope was that examining my own data may help me understand what kind of data is being sold to companies or being stored about me.
My Top Apps:
1) Instagram
2) TikTok
3) Snapchat
Average Amount of Time Spent on My Phone Daily:
4 hours and 30 minutes
With these apps and the amount of time spent on my phone daily, how much of my data is actually being collected?
Turns out a lot.
My top app, Instagram, is probably the app that collects the most data from me. I believe this because of the people, organizations, and accounts I follow as well as the general content I engage with. To find out more, I went into my settings on the app then clicked to view my activity. Here, I could see just about all of my activity on the app and was able to request to download my information to see all the content I shared with Instagram. The results were insane. I found out that Instagram had a lot more data about me than I had originally thought. It had saved every single piece of data from posts I've saved, message requests, to the comments I've read. It was crazy. All of this data was from my interactions with the app, but it was still scary to see that it was down to the date, time, and location of where I did these things.
My second top app, TikTok, was a bit more difficult to retrieve my data from. Nonetheless, I was most interested in the algorithm. TikTok is known for its artificially generated algorithm for its users and I was curious how my interaction on the app lead me to the algorithm I have today. I found that it really is just a matter of your engagement with the content. I was able to see how my engagement with different videos, audios, creators, and followers impacted what I saw on the app. For reference, I receive a lot more funny or comedic TikTok videos on my feed as opposed to the more trending videos because that is the content I engaged with more. (I also enjoy the cute animal videos as well, but who doesn't?) It was really interesting to see that something as simple as a like or a quick scroll through the comments influenced my feed so drastically and that TikTok had a condensed record of what exactly I liked and didn't.
The last app that took up most of my screen time (and data) was Snapchat. I think solely based off of Snapchat's privacy policy and general app structure, one would think our data on this app is a bit more secure or protected. But through my snooping, I found that this wasn't entirely true. Even though the app is designed to delete snaps and chats after 24 hours, it still keeps a record of your data and has a record of every single snap you've ever received or sent as well as when you add someone new or subscribe to a creator. That's crazy! I could scroll back to when I first downloaded the app and saw what time it was when I sent my first snap to my friend 7 years ago.
It was crazy to see how much of my data was actually being stored by these apps. Now with this newfound knowledge of technology and what data it takes, how does that affect my relationship with it?
To put it bluntly, there is no such thing as incognito anymore. It seems as if in this era of technology Big Brother and tin foil hats don't quite capture the evergrowing implications of surveillance. However, I don't write this to say that technology is the worst thing ever because I don't think that. If it weren't for technology, I wouldn't be able to connect with my friends from when I was younger, I wouldn't be able to call my mom, and I certainly wouldn't have the opportunity to engage with people and content online to enhance my studies. There are many positive aspects to technology, I think we just need to be a bit more cautious of the way we use it and how much data we share.
that I was always pretty aware of the dangers of technology as my parents eased us into things like cell phones and I didn't own one myself until I was about 14. I also by nature am a pretty modest and skeptical person when it comes to my online presence, so I have always been stingy with the data I share as well as being careful with what I post. I think if more people approached technology with more caution, we may see people second-guessing the amount of information they put online. If this begins to happen, I believe it may lessen the risks of a total surveillance state, which I don't think any of us want.
Looking to the future, there are a few different opinions on technology and its advancements. By giving your devices and media platforms permission to detailed information like your location, web searches, and more, you essentially hand them insight into your daily life routine, friends, and your interest. At the end of the day, it comes down to you whether you think this is a violation of your privacy or not.
Samuel Warren and Louis Brandeis stated in 1890 in The Right to Privacy that 'each person is entitled to full protection in terms of person and property.' This is especially applicable to today as emerging technology and social media platforms continue to become a larger part of our everyday lives. The idea of privacy invasion by these platforms is becoming more prominent.
With the gradual increase of our devices and social media platforms collecting our data and seeing how they use it, we begin to see different questions and opinions emerge. When does the data collection cross the line? Some people say it's already at an extreme and that this type of 'digital spying' is absurd and creepy. Others believe that this kind of data collection is harmless if it provides a more enhanced user experience. There isn't really a right or wrong answer as to how one feels about this, it's simply personal preference. But when (or if) it gets to become a civil liberties issue in America, I think there will be an outrage.
The next time you visit a website and it prompts you for your email, maybe take a second to find the 'x' button rather than using autogenerated texts to enter your information. Small decisions like these over time can keep you, your data, and those around you much safer in the continuously growing digital world.