Should We Be Deleting Facebook?
Should We Be Deleting Facebook?
Our privacy has been invaded! Does Facebook have no shame? OMG we are all going to delete Facebook right now! Those are the things you may have heard people say on Facebook recently when the social giant was slammed with a plethora of lawsuits last week. In case you have been under a rock, you probably heard of the recent, data breach that caused a series of lawsuits. While, it's tempting to go with the crowd and #deletefacebook, (even though most people won't) you might want to take a look at other instances of data mining breaches from years past.
What Are You Talking About?
That's right Facebook wasn't the only one hit with data mining breaches, nor are they the only ones that mine data. Two years ago, Target made a $18 million settlement for their huge data breach back in 2013 which affected 40 million credit and debit cards of shoppers who were shopping during the holidays. However, Target wasn't the only one that wasn't the only one that got hacked that year either; Equifax, Yahoo!, Uber and even the government were among the top data breaches that were made last year. It's also far from a new thing, companies have been using your personal information to sell to other companies for many years.
Amazon Was One of the First!
Amazon will be 24 in July and they were one of the first to data mine. That's right if you ordered from Amazon in the last 20 years , they already have all of your information. The same goes for eBay and every other eCommerce website on the internet. How do you think think all those websites know what you want before you even know it? The sad reality is that data mining helps companies so much that there is no stopping it and your privacy will be forever invaded.
What Can I Do?
It's extremely important to read the fine print when signing up for anything on the internet. It's not like you won't told about this after all. Companies will hide this information in the terms and services agreement and most will purposely make their terms and service agreement very long and hard to follow (I admit I do not read the terms and services myself when signing up for anything). You can of course, #deletefacebook, but you can also opt out of various companies that use and sell your information. It's important to remember that the sites that you don't have to pay for will have you paying in some other way and it will most likely be your privacy!