How Mundane Tech Completely ^%#@ Your Privacy or Why Third-Party Advertising Needs to Change

User privacy is at the deathbed… You know that, and we know that.?

In fact, this is the great cause of us writing articles on third-party cookies alternatives such as Privacy Sandbox and authenticated web. In our hearts, there’s a glimmer of hope that once Google shuts cookies, the web will become a more private space.

“But Epom, why should I care?” – Great question. We’re kinda used to Facebook and TikTok sharing our data left and right. That’s the price we are ready to pay for doom-scrolling memes. But the hand of capitalism reaches far beyond your feed. Once you dig deep enough, it goes truly uncanny.

Today, let’s have some fun and discover the less obvious threats to our privacy in some of the most mundane things. This messed up list is the reason why third-party advertising needs to change.

# 1. Cars

Starting off – the cars. An irresistible treat after experiencing public buses, a passion for tech-savvy caffeine addicts, or a symbol of luxury – cars are the life pillar of a modern human, as much as their smartphones.

It would be a great shame if cars were the worst products ever reviewed by PrivacyNotIncluded, Mozilla’s initiative that heavily researches what we discuss today. Guess what? They really are the worst.

It’s so bad – it almost feels like a South Park episode.?

• Out of all 25 reviewed car brands, all 25 collect more personal data than needed and use data for reasons detached from actual driving;

• 84% of the reviewed brands share or sell your data to service providers, data brokers, and other shady business organizations;

• 56% of brands are ready to share your data with the government or law enforcement in response to an informal request;

• 92% of brands don’t give the drivers the right to delete their data, even at a request.

And we haven’t even gotten to the fun stuff like Tesla’s untrustworthy AI responsible for 17 deaths and 736 crashes, Nissan gathering data about your sexual activity (good, we’re safe), and absolutely messed up privacy policies.

Seriously, though, just read the full report here. By the way, are you interested in who exactly collects sensitive data from your car manufacturer? The Markup has made a list of them.

Pro tip – buy an old car. They are generally more reliable, affordable, and stylish. Like this article if you want my bosses to raise me so I can finally afford an Integra Type R.

# 2. Healthcare & Religion

Being ill, both mentally and physically, sucks. The last thing the person with severe depression wants is to have the information about their condition sold to advertisers for better targeting.

Welp, more websites and apps that you’d think don’t really care about that. The report by Privacy International is demonizing programmatic advertising just a bit too much and isn’t as funny as the one above, but the conclusions are still unpleasant. Most importantly:

• 97% of researched healthcare websites contain third-party cookies. This isn’t that bad in theory, but the fact is that 76% of them use them for third-party advertising;

• Mind you, most of these websites enable third-party cookies even if the user rejects the request;

• Numerous depression websites also share profiles containing information on whether the user has depression or not with third-party brokers.

The degree of uncanniness gets higher once you look through popular healthcare apps on AppStore and PlayStore. From BetterHelp and Better Stop Suicide selling user data despite claiming the opposite to Cerebral (meditation app) leaking user info openly to Facebook and TikTok.

Want some more trash? It seems that paying $7.99 to Pray.com for “developing a daily habit for Jesus” isn’t enough, as you have to give some of your data as a bonus. The same goes for Glorify and Hallow. Well, Christianity is all about sacrifices; maybe that’s what the app developers want to imply.

# 3. Internet of Things

Smart homes being compromised is a bit ill-mannered to write about in 2024. Most of you have probably played Watch Dogs 2 or watched those episodes of Mr.Robot and Black Mirror. In fact, even now, 55% of smart home product owners are concerned about their security.

Mr.Robot - Smart House Scene

While the major CEOs claim that the Internet of Things is fine/you just use weak security/the privacy policies are strict, the researchers find otherwise. For example, the authors of this report with a menacing name, “In the Room Where It Happens,” conclude that:

We found evidence of IoT devices inadvertently exposing at least one PII (Personally Identifiable Information), like unique hardware address (MAC), UUID, or unique device names, in thousands of real world smart homes.?

Any single PII is useful for identifying a household, but combining all three of them together makes a house very unique and easily identifiable.?

For comparison, if a person is fingerprinted using the simplest browser fingerprinting technique, they are as unique as one in 1,500 people. If a smart home with all three types of identifiers is fingerprinted, it is as unique as one in 1.12 million smart homes.

And this is hardly the end of our rant. Just for the last year, PrivacyNotIncluded reported these:

• Google, with all their smart home & wearable devices, received massive fines in 2023 for glaring security breaches and how they use the data;

• Sonos trades your data with other data brokers;

• Wyze (home device/security manufacturer) collects a ton of personal data and sells it in a not-so-secure way;

• Amazon Ring shares most of your data with the government.

Btw, many wearable devices aren’t really secure, but don’t buy Angel Watch; it literally has no privacy policy.

# 4.? Sex & Romantics

Being hacked during sex should be the most awkward thing ever. Jokes aside, the security behind sex toys is laughable. It takes a free LightBlue app to know that your neighbor 20-30 m away is having fun with the buttplug rn.?

Do the fun gadgets really need to have an identifiable name, account holder, and email? Of course not. These glaring holes (sorry for this one) are most probably made like that to have your customer profile to later “share” it with other manufacturers or just use it to make marketing offers.

But that’s nothing compared to dating apps. At least, with sex toys, a vigilant tech-savvy user can protect themselves; the situation is different with Tinder, Grindr, and other applications alike.?

When submitting the info on your favorite Ninja Turtle, least favorite parent, and precise GPS location you voluntarily feed the algorithm a lot of crucial data for potential matches. In reality, the majority of app owners don’t do anything to secure these info clusters.

Namely:

• 80% of dating apps share or sell personal information for advertising;

• Doesn’t that sound bad? Well, it’s not just the information you share voluntarily. Every dating app can gather metadata on your chats, gallery photos, and literally every swipe;

• 52% earn PrivacyNotIncluded’s bad rep, meaning that the app owners don’t do the bare minimum to protect information from leaking;

• CoffeMeetsBagel (this name’s an abomination) most probably records and stores user video calls;

• Tinder collects your location information no matter if you consent or not;

In this short list, we haven’t even covered all of the controversies and outright lawsuits (this one’s my favorite and most messed up tho) connected to these companies because that’s not really the topic.?

Just know that there are a lot of them, and you’re essentially trading with the devil here. Go meet at the library or something, I don’t know.

# 5. AI Chatbots

Humans do enjoy rushing toward new technology without realizing the risks, but who are we to blame? ChatGPT Premium (big flex yo) was used for some research on this article which has saved us a ton of time.

Unfortunately, though, just like with everything on this list – the quality of technology has to be paid for with our personal data. It’s not as bad as what we’ve had so far. At least, in theory, AI chatbots won’t provide the non-public information on request.

However, the champion of bad privacy practices, Meta, proves that it can spoil even relatively new technology in a Guinness record time. Meta’s recent AI celebrity chatbots, which should attract new audiences to discuss loud bushes with virtual Snoop Dog, are already reported to have:

• Lack of proper encryption;

• Serious concerns over the amount of data gathered;

• Lack of understanding over where this data goes.

Luckily, a lot of modern chatbots (Meta’s not on the list ofc) allow you to disable “improving the model for everyone.” There’s still very little research into how bad things with the chatbots are, but we’d advise you to be cautious.?

AI companions don’t require all of your sensitive data to work, so don’t give it to them.

Literally 1984?

Now let’s be honest here, you have to be completely blind to not understand the state of user privacy. The point of this article is not to “take the red pill” and start living in the woods.?

On the contrary, we like tech and writing about it. This article is meant to provide some context so that the next time you see us discussing the delay of third-party cookies' death, you understand what’s at stake: your privacy in the car, bed, and even head.

Woah, that was a bit too gloomy. How about a joke written by ChatGPT:

“Why don't privacy policies ever get invited to parties?

Because they always bring a ton of baggage and never let anyone read the fine print!”

Hope you like it; stay tuned for more!