A Petition For Privacy

The latest “trumped” up scandal to try to destroy or at least cripple the Trump Presidency concerns the British firm Cambridge Analytics. They are accused (though they claim otherwise) of selling information and data to the Trump Presidential Campaign, as if this is some unusual act like necrophilia or something. Facebook was the first to complain, despite the fact that it opened the Facebook user base to the Presidential campaign of Barack Obama, which in part is credited with allowing the campaign to reach millions of new Millennial voters. However all that is a distraction from the real issue. Privacy is vanishing and by virtue of our inaction we are cooperating in its demise. Data about us is collected from our computers, telephones, jobs, credit bureaus, government agencies, organizations and clubs we participate in. Non-profit organizations sell our names, addresses, ages, salaries, employment data, income level and the list goes on. Even the Dept. of Motor Vehicles sells your information when you register your car or boat or trailer or truck and your driver’s license. Google and other apps track and record your every move, every store, every destination  throughout the day and sends to a central location where it is stored and sold. When you search for something on the web, stores selling that item start appearing in your browser. If you buy something the store or place you bought it from appears in your browser to sell you more. What is even worse is you can’t escape it without returning to the Stone Age. Did you ever try to close a Facebook account. It is almost impossible and even after you have succeeded, which can take months, they still keep your data. What about Google; they ain’t stupid. With a little work you can find out where all this monitoring activity takes place on your phone, however if you, for instance, turn off “location services” things like Google Maps or I-Phone’s  Find my Phone app wont work. I could go on for a long time on this but you get the idea. I hope that when the Congress looks into the collection and distribution of the personal data of individuals it decides that we need some protection from such intrusive activity. Privacy laws must be updated and people must have better options for opting out of what can only be called subversive and intrusive activity.