Is privacy crucial to you? GDPR and surveillance

Dr. Anna Turner of the Polish Academy of Sciences discuss privacy, surveillance and methods of resisting it.

(Interview is an updated version of the podcast Are you aware? p. "Flow surveillance, GDPR and mocking your privacy", which was published on 7 February 2023.)

Rafał Górski: ‘The net is “a place where anonymity dies”. Our right to privacy is spent here on same - slaughter. possibly we agree to lose our privacy, seeing the reasonable price for the miracles offered in return. Or possibly the willingness to quit their autonomy under a knife stems from specified strong peer pressure, a thought-provoking reaction called sheep's rush, that only a few, exceptionally hard, rebellious, feisty and firm characters are ready to effort to defy this pressure," warned us Sigismund Bauman.

On 28 January we celebrate individual Data Protection Day, established by the Committee of Ministers of the Council of Europe. Why, erstwhile the government wants to make it easier for the services to watch us, there are no hundreds of thousands of protesters on the streets, as was the case in 2012 during ACTA protests? Is privacy crucial to us?

Dr. Anna Turner: In fact, specified a change of approach to a situation where our privacy is destroyed or trampled may rise reasonable doubts. Unfortunately, we act somewhat in the words, “You can get utilized to everything.”

The surveillance practices we experience all day have become so omnipresent and so invasive that present they are part of the reality in which we function.

Let us besides not forget that in 2012 people who grew up without the net took part in the protest against the introduction of ACTA. Our view of privacy and surveillance was diametrically different from that of today's twenty-somethings, and their reality is, as it seems, always two-track: online and offline. That's why I'd be looking at the main reasons why we're not on the streets today, erstwhile we're on the streets 10 years ago.

Socrates said the beginning of wisdom is to specify concepts. There is something different for each of us under the slogan “privacy”. In fact, it is an abstract concept that everyone adapts to each other, to their needs, desires, beliefs, and consequently, everyone understands and defines this concept completely different.

Let me just quote a fewer definitions that work in social sciences. Dutch prof. of communication sciences Jan van Dijk, who has been since the 1980s. The 20th century conducts very well-known investigation on the impact of fresh media on society, defines privacy as a circumstantial kind of right to freedom of individual decision whether and to what degree it is ready to open up to others. I will besides mention any older definitions of privacy from before the net era. For example, prof. of Law Alan F. Westin, author of the classical book “Private and Freedom” published in the 1960s, defines privacy as the right of individuals to specify “when, how and to what extent” information about them is transmitted.

The first publication devoted to the request to establish the right to privacy was published in 1890 in the American magazine “Harvard Law Review”, which inactive exists today.

The title of this publication is “The right to privacy” and was written by 2 lawyers who defined privacy as the right to be left alone.

Very good definition.

Definitely on time. 1 cannot neglect to mention the views of Sigismund Bauman, which he shares in the book “Flying Surveillance”, in which he points to a reversal of the situation. I quote: "In a day of fresh technologies, the public sphere is experiencing a real invasion, flood and conquest of privacy, and being a celebrity, so surviving constantly in front of others, in the light of spotlights and without the right to privacy, is present the most widely promoted and popular model of successful life."

It is hard not to ask ourselves whether privacy is inactive crucial to us.

A known sociological maxim says discipline is driven by ideas, but disciplined by facts. This is what we stick to in our work, and these in investigation clearly indicate that privacy understood as data and information protection is, however, highly crucial to us.

What's the result?

A Eurobarometer survey entitled "Digital Rights and Principles", conducted in 2021, asked respondents from European Union countries, among others, how crucial it is for them to be kept confidential and to defend telephone and SMS calls, which is 1 of the fundamental principles of our privacy. erstwhile we look at the results of Polish respondents, for precisely 51% it is very important, and for 35% it is important, i.e. together we have 86% of Polish respondents, for whom confidentiality of their conversations is very crucial or important. Interestingly, only 11% of those surveyed – this is inactive 1 of the highest results in the European Union – the confidentiality of telephone calls and text messages is not very important.

The same survey asked respondents to choose the risks they fear most on the Internet. Data theft was listed first. On the second kid safety, and on the 3rd usage of data and individual information, but no longer only by hackers or individuals who want to bargain our identity, but besides by companies and government institutions.

This means that we see, as a very real threat, that our data is being utilized without our cognition by government institutions.

We're afraid of surveillance. If we follow earlier studies, they show that the percent of people for whom confidentiality and data safety are crucial is constantly increasing. In answering your question, ‘Is privacy crucial to us?’, I think it is and most likely more crucial than ever.

We operate without censorship. We don't advertise, we don't charge for texts. We request your support. Throw yourself in the media.

Are we dealing with the end of privacy?

I'm leaning towards specified a thesis that we're dealing with her fragmentation, but surely not at her end.

What does that mean?

Fragmentarisation means that privacy is no longer as clearly defined as before the net era – it is very fluid. Referring to Sigismund Bauman's book again, it frequently changes its position, changes its form and, with the improvement of fresh technologies, each of us will fragment the concept of privacy, that is, adapts to the situation, context, tools that are utilized at a given moment. Privacy is inactive crucial to us. investigation shows that the attack on our privacy continues to be considered in terms of 1 of the biggest threats on the Internet.

A very interesting survey was besides produced, the results of which were published in an article entitled “Why privacy keeps dying?” or “Why privacy is constantly dying?”. The authors of this article analysed over 100 texts from the 1990s and 2000s, in which “the end of privacy” was announced. Meanwhile, as I call it, the "endism of privacy" seems to last for decades and is not truly circumstantial for a given period, but is linked to the improvement of technology.

"A comparatively inexpensive smartphone with a browser is all you request to access global information resources. You give us more information about yourself, about your friends, and we can improve the quality of our search. You don't gotta compose anything. We know where you are. We know where you've been. We know more or little what you're thinking,” says Eric Schmidt, “Godfather” of Larry Page and Sergey Brin, Google owners. What kind of surveillance are we dealing with today?

In fact, it is an ubiquitous surveillance. Following the September 11, 2001 attacks on the WTC, a fresh model of action emerged at the interface between safety policy and the improvement of military technologies. At the same time, the Google search engine, which sought ways to increase the company's modest revenues at the time, besides set itself the goal of mapping the net space. It comes to the perfect symbiosis between the 2 players. On the 1 hand, government institutions request tools for fresh technologies to be able to announce the fight against terrorism on a fresh basis, on the another hand Google, recognizing the possible in its data collection, begins to turn the net into a space of commercial oversight.

The second major step in expanding surveillance is the emergence of social media and the creation of smartphones, which was very openly communicated by Eric Schmidt – the then president of Google, saying at a press conference: "You know, a comparatively inexpensive smartphone with a browser is all you request to access global information resources." From this point on, our Faustian pact, as I call it, Shoshana Zuboff, from which, as we know from Goethe's book, breaking out is almost impossible. From now on, the telephone is with us everywhere, different ways of surveillance, we have it with us in the bedroom, in the bathroom, in the gym, shopping, erstwhile we visit friends erstwhile we move.

We don't should be online for data, information about us to flow across a wide stream.

See how much you can say about individual by just monitoring the location of his phone. This individual doesn't should be online yet, he doesn't gotta surf the web looking for songs, shopping. Looking at the location only, we can say, for example, where individual lives, whether they live alone or with individual who works, at home or outside the house. What kind of lifestyle does he have, whether he goes to the gym, or runs, or goes to church, to movies, to walks, or meets friends, or eats in restaurants, or travels often. See how many groups you can qualify for. This allows us to offer her circumstantial services or products online. After individual lives and works, we will find the material position on the basis of which they can see offers only from a matched price shelf. If it is individual physically active, it is very likely that he will see advertising not only sports companies, but besides discounts to the beginning gym.

What if individual doesn't have a telephone with a location function?

Even if it only connects to the telecommunications network, we are already able to find where it is.

So if a citizen doesn't have a smartphone, has an old button phone, they can control what they do and where?

Yes, and unfortunately, they don't request a court order for that, that's what it looks like. Now let's imagine you have a smartphone. Most people have a smartphone and have it with them. Let us combine what we already know with the another information that includes our phone, photos, our data, search stories, purchases, music and what conclusion can we come to? It turns out we're in a alleged zero-sum game, in which we're definitely not on the winning side. We're actually just actors in the news show. In short, surveillance present is ubiquitous.

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"Facebook will know about all book read, all song heard by the user, and its predictive models will tell you which bar to go to erstwhile you arrive in a abroad city, where the bartender will wait with his favourite drink," Mark Zuckerberg informs us.

Why do we accept surveillance practices? How do young people who, as you mentioned earlier, do not remember time without the Internet?

I'll answer a small perversely. We don't actually agree to them, at least that's what we say. It's inactive showing the investigation I brought up. As a result, we are faced with a contradictory situation, which in the literature of the subject is called "privacy paradox", or "privacy paradox".

It is that, on the 1 hand, privacy is very crucial to us, and we declare it, but on the another hand, our behaviour on the net clearly contradicts it. There's a kind of paradox.

Why? For at least 3 reasons. First of all, we agree to this ubiquitous presence of surveillance, to which we are increasingly accustomed. As a result, we do not pay attention to all devices and information we know are spying on, controlling and monitoring us. Secondly, for any deficiency of choice – the net is so profoundly rooted in our individual and professional lives that we cannot quit it completely. Third, out of fear or possibly more out of longing for life without fear – out of request and desire for peace.

Our large philosopher Leszek Kołakowski wrote about the thought of order and order, about the reality in which we live well, comfortably, safely. Sigismund Bauman in his book, which we have already discussed today, besides draws attention to the factors that in the planet of liquid surveillance address these desires of order, order and peace.

What are these factors Bauman writes about?

Cameras, locks, safety and monitoring systems, security, whether a advanced barrier around the estate, and preferably all at once. This request for security, which has been expected for almost 20 years, is the main motive justifying the government's usage of surveillance to guarantee our safety. If the government says that it needs access to our data to guarantee our security, the question arises: “From whom”? Who's the another guy we're afraid of and who needs to be protected from, who we're putting fences against, who we're putting cameras on? The answer is rather simple: it is possibly all alien on the street.

It comes down to the fact that each of us becomes a suspect, each of us becoming a possible origin of danger.

That's why, in order not to be a origin of danger, and at the same time to defend ourselves from danger, we trust that all this surveillance works in the name of security. It's for our own good to be scanned at airports, fingerprinted and de facto The more control we gotta go through, the safer we feel, or at least we think we do.

After all, we good, decent people have nothing to hide, we will get out of this unharmed, confirming our integrity and integrity. I sincerely hope that, in the end, this eternal safety surveillance matrimony will begin to decision towards divorce. Unfortunately, it is doing very well for now, as is besides confirmed by the results of the European Social survey conducted in our Institute.

Imagine that erstwhile asking respondents about the usage of surveillance practices, we will add the end “in pandemic” or “in order to guarantee security”, “in order to guarantee national security”, immediately the support increases by respective percent points. In another words, if we ask the respondents, ‘Is privacy crucial to you?’ "Do you think the government should have access to your data?", more than half are against it. The situation is changing erstwhile we add “in case of pandemic”, “for safety”. We think someone's doing something about it, possibly it's the right thing, possibly it's safer. It's working for now. How long? We'll see.

Does GDPR defend us? I ask due to the fact that we have tiny companies or social organizations that gotta comply with GDPR regulations. Their numbers are increasing at an alarming rate. For example, at the Institute of civilian Affairs, we had to hire a Data Protection Officer (IOD), whose primary work is that our organization processes individual data of its employees, customers, suppliers and another persons in accordance with applicable data protection regulations. Moreover, there are checks by the Office for individual Data Protection (UODO), which imposes advanced penalties. And at the same time, we're dealing with services that control us unpunishedly. An example of US NSA spying on citizens around the world. We have corporations like GAFAM (Google, Amazon, Facebook, Apple, Microsoft)The ones who are watching us unpunished. We have banks collecting data about us.. Isn't that mocking us citizens?

You answered the question very well, not only from the data administrator, but besides from each of us, the average user in the fight against large corporations.

Let me remind you that the EU Data Protection Regulation entered into force 5 years ago in mid-2018. The main rights that GDPR should represent include information from the admin in the event of the leak of our data, making it available to incorrect persons. I will usage an pictorial story, although it is worth adding that this is simply a situation 2 years ago, so in the period erstwhile the GDPR should apply. At the time, 533 million people leaked data from Facebook, including over 2.5 million from Poland. And what happened? It's okay. Facebook didn't study it, he kept it to himself. Alon Gal, a cybersecurity specialist, informed about this. What happened next? Nothing. As an individual, I can bring Facebook to court, claim damages. I can imagine how long this full process would have lasted.

Perhaps the smaller Polish companies are being punished and the process works a small faster, but if companies are dealing with a giant like Facebook, who abruptly "lost" data of over 500 million people, it turns out to be untouchable and nothing can be done about it.

Another law that should warrant us GDPR is simply a law that allows us to know what will happen to our data and to inform us in a understandable way. You gotta have quite a few self-constipation to get through this information, and it's not much. I take care of them all day, click on the privacy settings and preferences regarding who and for what intent my data will be transmitted. As I open a given website, this information is very frequently neither clear nor understandable – on the contrary, the pop-up window is annoying. It is designed in specified a way that we immediately click on this version, which allows for the full usage of our data. GDPR is not working. Work is being done to improve it. It is now a EU regulation which masks our request to know what is happening to our data and who has access to it. In conclusion, the thought is great, but the performance is weak.

What do you say to people who say that surveillance has no problem due to the fact that they have nothing to hide?

This is the attitude that I was talking about in our desire to guarantee a sense of security. We are happy to submit to surveillance practices precisely for the sake of demonstrating that I have nothing to hide: “I am righteous and honest, search out these evil terrorists.” Unfortunately, this approach results in each of us being a possible suspect. This is not a healthy situation, and as long as the fishy can take us as a neighbor, although it is not an perfect situation, it is not bad either. But if as a fishy we're getting classified by an algorithm of a government institution we don't really know exists, we don't know how this algorithm works, how we've been classified, this is where the problems begin.

It may turn out that we're not getting credit, that we're gonna have problem traveling, that we're gonna start eavesdropping on our telephone that we won't really know about.

Such an approach: “I have nothing to hide” seemingly gives us a sense of security, but we can be followed as a consequence of an mistake we will not really know about.

As far as algorithms are concerned, we don't know how they work, we don't know what the rules are, but we know that our data is collected without our knowledge, and there's actually nothing we can do about it. That is why this strategy: ‘I have nothing to hide,’ ‘I am here’ or ‘we are not blocking windows in my own home’ is not good.

How can any of us defy surveillance? "In principle, I do not believe that we have any influence on the most crucial social changes. (...) Even if I deplore what is happening in the planet today, it does not interest [me] to undo the clock, due to the fact that I do not believe that this is possible,” wrote Michel Houellebecq.

I disagree with him. I think we have a lot to do, and we gotta do these things first and foremost to defend ourselves from surveillance to defy it. First of all, effort to spend little time online. In the past fewer years, investigation has increasingly seen a trend that is known in literature as "digital disconnect". It means that net users effort to limit their online presence for various reasons: due to the overwhelming amount of information, the deficiency of privacy, there is frequently a desire to spend offline time with their family, with friends, to take care of their interests.

There are already more than 40% of users in Western European countries who restrict the usage of the Internet.

I hope that in Poland we will do specified a survey next year.

The second phase that comes to head is consciousness and education. The fact that we're talking about this is simply a very good sign. That means someone's interested.

I'd like to urge the books we're talking about. I exchanged “The Age of Capitalism of Surveillance” Shoshany Zuboff, Sigmund Bauman's “Flying Surveillance”, who, though released 10 years ago, truly did not lose anything on its actuality. We besides have large theatrical performances. "Secret research" directed by Ivan Wyrypayev to watch on the Internet. I urge participation in exhibitions, I say this from my own Warsaw yard. We have late had 2 fantastic exhibitions dedicated to fresh technologies and surveillance: “Seeing Stones” and “Space Beyond the Valley” and earlier “TheGlassroom ExperienceThe exhibition is besides available online. Let us support organizations like the Lord, who fight for our rights on our behalf. We should besides mention the Panoptykon Foundation. Sites of specified foundations are mines of cognition and advice.

Any advice on the technologies we use?

As for the method guidelines we can apply erstwhile utilizing the net daily, let us leave the telephone at home. Two, turn off the location, turn off the telephone for the night, leave him in the another room. I'll besides go back to what you started with: let's pay cash, so not just cards. Let's do regular cleaning in our email box, it's not easy, I do it myself, I know how much time it takes, but it's worth it to get into habit. What would this order be about?

Let's limit the number of applications, remove those we don't use, delete accounts from sites we don't use, unsubscribe from newsletters we don't need.

Let's change the privacy settings in your browser, block cookies from another companies, and besides delete them regularly. For more advanced I urge utilizing VPN and TOR networks to guarantee your anonymity.

But returning to Houellebecq, Bauman besides questions this diagnosis made by him, but agrees with his argument. Bauman writes that the "all things lost" approach is absolutely unthinkable, due to the fact that we can argue it, we can say "NO", while at the same time following the imagination of what our future should look like.

Finally, I left to myself the opinion of prof. Barbara Skarga, whom Zygmunt Bauman considered to be 1 of the most outstanding and incredibly delicate to the troubles of human being in the planet of philosophers. Her short but optimistic opinion I would like to point out: "The thought of a human being is not standing, it is constantly moving towards something better". I hope that's what happens in our fight against surveillance.

Thank you for talking to me.