Collecting data threatens our freedom if we are not careful

 According to Couldry, we are living during a datafication, where the importance and capitalistic value of data is increasing in all sectors of the society.

The concentration of data controlling creates conditions for the birth of unprecedented concentrations of power. Regardless, lawmakers have not yet noticed the problems that data collection presents, says media researcher Nick Couldry.

– The EU’s General Data Protection Regulation, GDPR, states that collection of data is not natural, and should be controlled. The GDPR is one of the first signs of the society noticing this new situation.

Nick Couldry is a professor of Media, Communications and Social Theory at London School of Economics. Couldry is an internationally appraised media researcher who has a background in sociology. According to Couldry, we are living during a datafication, where the importance and capitalistic value of data is increasing in all sectors of the society. Data is important in trade agreements, geopolitics and international relations. The movements of data are imbalanced, and the areas where data is moving are winners.

The main idea of datafication is that a growing part of people’s actions are convertible and categorizable into data that computers can process. The collection of data makes it easier to find places and creates opportunities to customize offers, but at the same time it enables the creation of an unprecedented surveillance machine.

– Datafication can be thought of as an ideology which we all implement by constantly communicating, getting dependent on apps and giving them the right to collect our data. The companies collecting the data tell us a story of the usefulness of data and being connected. People have embraced this story, and this benefits the companies collecting the data.

When everyone is on social media and there is no way out

If someone had asked us ten or twenty years ago if we want to become a part of a data collection network and be under surveillance via the means of data collection, we would have said no. No matter how it would make our lives easier and more entertaining, Couldry claims.

– Every computer collects data. This way we have accidentally built a surveillance machine and system no government could have even dreamt of a couple of decades ago.

– Every computer collects data. This way we have accidentally built a surveillance machine and system no government could have even dreamt of a couple of decades ago.

Twenty years ago the idea of being under constant surveillance was connected to totalitarian states. During the times of the Soviet Union and East Germany, collecting information of people was a sign of a big brother government and an evil state. Nowadays data is collected in much larger quantities but instead of governments it is collected by companies for capitalistic purposes.

– Now we are being told that data collection and utilization is a part of a good life: cheaper prices and personalized advertising. But the threat of people losing their freedom still exists, even if the reason for data collection has changed.

It is pure fantasy to think we could control the use of the data we have given up

Couldry believes there is no point in listing the things datafication has made normal because it has changed the whole way we think of a human life. Data collection may not change our behaviour because we do not know of it or understand its scope. It is easy to be amiable towards giving up your data as long as doing so gives you good offers or personalized route plans. The bad parts become visible when an algorithm prevents you from getting an insurance, and there is no arguing against the data it has collected.

The systems collecting data were built with good intentions, Couldry stresses. People give up their data because it benefits their everyday lives. That is why giving up your data is so addicting. According to Couldry one should not underestimate the ambitions of companies profiting from data collection as the technological opportunities to collect data increase. Capitalism focused on data collection removes the boundaries between society and free market. The algorithms collecting and utilizing data are privately controlled and invisible.

– Companies have the motivation to collect and own all possible data, control it and benefit from it financially. This creates enormous concentrations of power as the importance of owning data grows.

Amazon and Google are some of the biggest companies in the world. Their business is increasingly based on creating value with data. Google’s monopoly is based on the amount of data it collects; no one is able to compete with it.

– Before, I needed to be enticed to enter a store if one wanted to profit from me. Now I am profitable because I am a part of social media where I am producing data.

– Before, I needed to be enticed to enter a store if one wanted to profit from me. Now I am profitable because I am a part of social media where I am producing data. All areas of the human life can be made profitable by data collection, says Couldry.

Datafication can be compared to colonialism

Some see datafication as a new stage of capitalism where value is created by utilizing data in a capitalistic way instead of producing new material. Couldry sees that datafication is not a new stage of capitalism but a preliminary stage which will enable this new era.

He compares datafication to colonialism which preceded industrial capitalism. Colonialism meant a significant change in world order as the superpowers sent expeditions to conquer the colonial countries and take over their natural resources and enslaved people to work for them. Datafication realises Marx’s ideas of capitalism as a social order defining the everyday life, according to Couldry.

– Colonialism created profits which enabled what we nowadays know as our economic system. Today we see this system, meaning capitalism, as the norm. Now we are on the preliminary stages of a new era where we can still stop it and take control of it in a democratic way.

According to Couldry the problem is false consent, referring to the way that people give up their rights to their data by an almost routine click, and without being informed decision makers. They do not know where the data goes or how it is used, and they do not actually have a possibility to not give up their data. The downside of living constantly online is that it makes people dependent on it. The stronger the network, the more difficult it is to remain outside of it.

– The Cambridge Analytica scandal might become a starting point for a societal conversation on the use of data. Being a part of a network is just so nice, practical, and increasingly necessary.

Couldry, together with his colleague Ulises A. Mejías, has published the book Colonized by data about datafication.

– In the book we do not claim that people become slaves for corporations. However, we are living during historic times that can be compared to colonialism, and these times threaten our freedom if we are not careful.

Translation by Heli Luosujärvi. The translator is a Master’s-level student of Multilingual Communication and Translation Studies at Tampere University. The translation was produced as part of a project course in English Translation.