Consumers Should Be Cautious With Their Personal Data
There have been numerous data scandals in recent months in the digital world. Multinational European companies like Germany’s Telekom and discount grocery store Lidl have been accused of spying on their employees, while several worrying cases in which address and account number information was illegally exchanged have raised alarms.
The Internet search engine Google caused a stir by providing images of entire streets of houses and social networking Web sites like Facebook have become sources of information that employers can easily tap into.
In Germany, the parliament, in its last regular meeting of the legislative period at the beginning of July, passed a change in the country’s data protection law. No one was actually satisfied with the compromise. For example, personal data can still be used without permission from its owner by advertisers or non-profit organizations. The politicians did not write into the law that an expressed agreement must be obtained in advance.
And the basic trend continues: More and more activity is taking place on the Internet, and thus the abuse danger rises. But data protection advocates say this isn’t a time for fatalism — they advise people to take countermeasures. Citizens and consumers are not able to protect themselves against all attempts to collect information about them, said Thilo Weichert, director of the independent state center for data protection in Germany.
“There is no such thing as one hundred per cent protection,” said Weichert. But by developing a higher sensibility and establishing ground rules, the risks can be reduced at least to a degree in which the individual still has the possibility of controlling his own data.
Rena Tangens, founder of a citizens’ rights and data protection association called FoeBud in Germany, also encourages more self-initiative in the private sphere. Consumers still assume the law protects them. The law is often not sufficient on one hand and on the other it is not capable of punishing offenses retroactively. Essentially, it is better to think preventively and release as little information about oneself as possible.
Privacy specialists call it data frugality. It means that to the extent possible consumers should minimize the amount of data they release into circulation, especially, but not only, in their use of electronic communications, particularly those susceptible to being spied upon. The less frequently one uses these means of communication, the more difficult it becomes for advertisers and other interested parties to establish a profile.
“When a consumer communicates electronically and leaves behind traces, there always is the risk these traces can be used for purposes other than intended,” Weichert stressed.
