Big Data: Is online privacy a possibility?

Data collection comes back to haunt me in the form of direct mail (e.g.junk mail) on a daily basis. So who are the biggest culprits?

1. Google
2. Apple
3. Facebook
4. Amazon





These four global giants all require you to sign over personal details during the sign up process in exchange for the services they offer (Li & Ling, 1998).

So is a cyber life with you in control possible? Janet Vertesi set out to experiment this prospect and drew the following conclusions. Yes it is possible, through censored social network action, cash payments, sites such as Tor and DuckDuckGo and having a lock up as a delivery address Ms. Vetesi could shop and search online without being tracked. However this took a lot of effort and meant she and her partner could not enjoy discounts, offers and freely chat on social networking sites with family and friends.

So in the end it depends on the extent to which you value your data. For me the use of social networking sites (Facebook, LinkedIn & Instagram), Google Chrome and etc. is imperative, so for now it´s a question of self censoring.

Li, C., & Ling, C. X. (1998). Data Mining for Direct Marketing: Problems and Solutions. KDD. Vol.98, p1-7.