Smartphone apps and other online services make our lives super convenient. Just think about navigating through a city you are not familiar with when you go traveling around the world. It would be a tremendous help to find directions with just one click on your phone. Of course, we can always do it the traditional way, by asking people for directions. But sometimes it would save much more time if you can get the answers right away. For all their usefulness, there is something that most people probably don't realize. The more they use these apps, the more data is stored and sent to companies who operate those apps. And the more concerning part of this is what they can do with our data.
For example, data about a mobile phone’s past location and movement patterns can be used to predict where a person lives, who their employer is, where they attend religious services and the age range of their children based on where they drop them off for school.
These predictions label who you are as a person and guess what you’re likely to do in the future. Research shows that people are largely unaware that these predictions are possible, and, if they do become aware of it, don’t like it.
(Image credit: Jens Johnsson/Unsplash)
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