Not wishing to step on anyone's toes, but I'm wondering if the sale
lease or transfer of digital traffic is fundamentally an invasion of
privacy? This question somewhat begs the destruction of the entire
Data Purveyor industry that has grown to such gigantic proportions
the last several years, so I ask it rather gingerly.
Trying to put my finger on the defining characteristic of today's
practices leads me to two conclusions about what is quite different
from the world I knew in my youth. First, one < cannot opt-in
> to such commercial databases. Second, for all practical
purposes there is < no substitutability > of other goods for
electronic communications.
So what is "personal data" anyway? Common sense indicates to me that
it is all information that < I deem > is personal. I deem my
weight, for instance, is personal information., private to me. So
should < I choose > not to answer a given question when I know
its answer, ipso facto I am deeming it "none of your damn business".
It seems with few exceptions -- such as one's legal name -- can
others deem that certain factoids are not subject to < my
designation > of its privacy. Otherwise, dear ontologists, what does
"privacy" actually mean?
Surely there's a classically ontological answer to this most basic
question.
Secondly is the matter of economic substitution of goods, which may
be better addressed elsewhere. FWIW, common sense indicates to me
that digital communications are like water; it is ineluctable to
meaningful participation in Western societies. If one thinks it's
alright to privatize water resources, then it would be consistent to
think it's okay to privatize digital traffic (and I am including
here, for purposes of scope, even Apache log files). Digital traffic
comprising both metadata and content data, digital traffic
comprising both that sourced directly from persons and that sourced
from any and all devices used by persons.
Anyway I conclude that digital traffic < in its totality >
cannot be allowed to be privatized goods which can be sold leased or
transferred by private entities to others without causing
significant disproportionate harm to societies. The oft-cited
trade-off benefits of incidental and better-targeted advertising is
simply trivial in the larger context of healthy public discourse and
interaction.
Reference: http://business.financialpost.com/2014/01/15/google-inc-privacy-health-canada/?__lsa=9b09-2c5f
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