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Data and power · 2 min read
Who is collecting your data, and why
Apps, advertisers, data brokers and attackers all want it, for different reasons.
Not everyone who collects data is a villain. Your bank needs your details. A map app needs your location. The trouble starts when collection goes far beyond what the service needs, or when the data is passed along.
The usual collectors
- The apps you use. Many record what you tap, read and send, and keep it long after you stop caring.
- Advertisers. Free products are often paid for by ads, which run on profiles built from your behavior.
- Data brokers. Companies that compile records from many sources, then sell or share them. Most people have never heard of them.
- Attackers. Criminals who steal databases and sell them, then use them for scams and identity theft.
A simple test
Ask two questions about any service: how does it make money? and what happens to my data if it is breached? If the answer to the first is advertising, your data is the product. If the answer to the second is "readable by anyone who gets in," you are trusting a lot.
Why encryption changes the answer
When messages are end-to-end encrypted, the company storing them holds only scrambled data it cannot open. It cannot sell what it cannot read, and a thief who steals it gets scrambled data too. Read more in who can read your messages.