I asked Mayer if he believed there was reason to worry that one’s
porn-browsing history could be sold — say, to a potential employer — or made
public. “I’m not aware of any company intentionally doing either,” he said.
“But it’s just one rogue employee or data breach away.” The recent revelation
that the NSA spied on Muslim “radicals’” porn-viewing habits with the plan of
using that information to discredit them makes the threat seem all that more
real. “The NSA gets most of its data from private companies. They’re the start
of the surveillance supply chain,” said Downey. “It might start with
quote-unquote radicals, but it could go to any one of us.”
So should you worry about your porn being tracked? Yes. There is plenty
of reason for concern. But remember that ad trackers aren’t just on porn sites
— they’re on social networks, financial websites, medical forums, you name it.
In fact, an Abine study found that porn sites had fewer trackers than almost
any other category of site. As one privacy analyst put it to me, focusing on
porn tracking minimizes the problem. What you watch on YouJizz is the very
least of it. (“Who’s tracking your porn?,”
Tracy Clark-Flory, Salon.com)
- - - - -
KPinSEA
"The piece
went on to report that the details of one’s visit to a porn site “could be
incorporated into the vast dossiers that internet, advertising and data
companies create about individuals, and are used to tailor the ads and content
people see.”"
What undiscovered tribe in the Amazon
didn't know this already?
It still matters when we
decide to float this up as a matter of public consideration. We all know that
visits to porn sites could be used to down an awful lot of people. Dave Eggers'
"The Circle" had as part of its plot the mass downing of disfavored
politicians by a reveal of this sort of tracking data. It could be that we're
focusing on this possibility — the easy ruin of almost anyone in America,
instantly—as preamble, as a laying out, for the next incarnation and character
of Occupy.
Eggers' version, though,
was of most people favoring the
reveal, as they were all members of the same unity — the Circle — not those
fearing being spied out by investigators. If we all somehow develop into such a
unity and all our past "sins" are excused by being part of a time
when we were different people — still yet unclean — with a different relation
to the state, we might actually approve all the tracking, and want more
of it to target those who must hate, hate, hate the nation so much to find so much wrong
with it.
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