Newsplaining

By: 
Ethan Stoetzer

Conservative, Democrat or power washer, we can all agree to have some privacy 
     Amid a frenzy of congressional activity last week — the hearings and vote on President Donald Trump’s supreme court nominee Neil Gorsuch and the house of representatives vote on the American Health Care Act — the U.S. Senate made an under the radar vote reversing a Federal Communication Commission regulation that aimed to protect consumers from Internet Service Providers (ISPs).
     Last Thursday, the senate passed a party line vote, 50-48, on a resolution that would nullify regulations by the FCC, mandating that ISPs like Comcast, Verizon, Century Link, AT&T, etc., get permission from consumers to sell their internet and browsing data to third parties.
     Through the Congressional Review Act, Congress has the ability to review regulations and decide whether or not they are useful, and can strike down such attempts at regulation. Through this act, the Congress could freeze the FCC’s regulating power to create similar regulations in the future.
     In October 2016, the FCC sided with consumers, making it impossible for ISPs and apps to sell information obtained about users without their consent. Such data would include your purchase history, your trips in your community that are tracked by your phone (the Weather Channel tracks your location for weather and could then sell your behavior to a third party), private messages on mobile apps, Google searches, etc.
     The vote was party line, 3-2, but nonetheless, made the regulation to protect consumers.
     According to the Washington Post, back at the time of the approval, the regulation restricted “trading health data, financial information, Social Security numbers and the content of emails and other digital messages. The rules force service providers to tell consumers what data they collect and why, as well as to take steps to notify customers of data breaches.”
     This month, an appeal on behalf of U.S. Sen. Jeff Flake (R-Arizona.), chairman of the Senate Judiciary Subcommittee on Privacy, Technology and the Law was made in the form of such resolution that was passed, stating, “The FCC's midnight regulation does nothing to protect consumer privacy.  It is unnecessary, confusing and adds yet another innovation-stifling regulation to the internet.”
     Should both houses of congress approve the resolution, it would halt the FCC regulation, thus allowing ISPs and apps full authority to take your behavioral data and sell it. Hypothetically, if anyone has a FitBit, the app could take your medical information regarding your activity and diet, and sell it to third parties. The Weather Channel can sell your locations to third parties. Your browsing history can be sent to third parties.
     Now, these third parties are most likely going to be advertising agencies that will spam you ads to buy products that you’ve searched or are in need of, or items near you.
     As can be seen with Google and Facebook, this is already done with your profiles and Google searches. In case you haven’t noticed, Facebook and Google post ads correlating to past searches and likes. YouTube also does this in broadcasting their advertisements, based on past videos you’ve seen.
     All in all, this has really just made your internet experience inconvenient. In an age where pretty much everything is free on the internet (pirated movies, YouTube itself, news, websites) companies have had to figure out a way to make money off of users without discouraging them from coming to their site. Witnessing crazy amounts of ads pertaining to your likes and past searches is a small price to pay for remaining in contact with your friends and having answer to questions with the push of a button, but what’s the limit of our acquiescence? How much will we let be sold of our behaviors before it’s too much?
     ISPs have been looking for ways to monetize the internet since smartphones became nearly ingrained into our society. When Net Neutrality regulations were passed in 2015, that was a major blow to internet providers in an attempt to offset cable-cutting and cheap internet access. Net Neutrality basically means that ISPs like Comcast and Verizon, could not tailor download speeds based on companies paying them.
     For instance, lets say Amazon is paying Comcast $5 million to make its content a priority on all its servers, and Netflix is only paying Comcast $3 million, Netflix viewers will be pushed to the back of the line, meaning more buffering time, if access is even allowed at all. The slippery slope argument for this would be that anyone with a lot of money could ensure that only their message can be seen and not anyone else’s. If the New York Times paid $10 billion while other companies only paid millions, the New York Times would have a monopoly on making sure you only live in a place where you can access their content.
     Since that problem is no longer the case, ISPs are still looking for ways to make money and lobbying to have this regulation repealed ensures they can be profitable selling your behavior to the highest bidder. To say that this is an “onerous” or “useless” regulation is to evaluate an individual’s constitutional right to privacy as not important. We, as people, have a right to live in our homes, away from others, in privacy. What we do on our own time is our business, not the business of companies to make money off of our dieting habits or purchase histories.
     Sure, you can make the argument that you signed up for this when you wanted access to the Internet, but that argument doesn’t take into account that there is no alternative. Just about every profession in the 21 Century requires internet access. Farmers need it to get up-to-the-second updates on commodity prices. Accountants need access to tax code information available mostly online now. The average American needs the internet to pay bills, watch videos, read stories, etc. And if you don’t subscribe to Comcast, Mediacom, Verizon, Century Link, AT&T, etc., then you have no way of accessing the internet.
     Sure, maybe you just get sold ads, but any invasion of privacy cannot be played off as unimportant in the grand scheme of things.
     Your family photos (how many kids you have, how old you are, where you go to school), your diet, your searches… all will be in the hands of someone else besides you, should this pass. Maybe it’s ads. Then again, maybe the highest bidder is the government. Maybe ads are harmless, but with a foot in the door, to what ends would your privacy actually be safe? All you need is a start up advertising company and some cash flow, and the lives of millions are at your finger tips.
 
    
 

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