Whats next for our privacy?
MIT Technology Reviews Whats Next series looks across industries, trends, and technologies to give you a first look at the future. You can read the rest of them here.Every day, we are tracked hundreds or even thousands of times across the digital world. Cookies and web trackers capture every website link that we click, while code installed in mobile apps tracks every physical location that our devicesand, by extension, wehave visited. All of this is collected, packaged together with other details (compiled from public records, supermarket member programs, utility companies, and more), and used to create highly personalized profiles that are then shared or sold, often without our explicit knowledge or consent.A consensus is growing that Americans need better privacy protectionsand that the best way to deliver them would be for Congress to pass comprehensive federal privacy legislation. While the latest iteration of such a bill, the American Privacy Rights Act of 2024, gained more momentum than previously proposed laws, it became so watered down that it lost support from both Republicans and Democrats before it even came to a vote.There have been some privacy wins in the form of limits on what data brokersthird-party companies that buy and sell consumers personal information for targeted advertisements, messaging, and other purposescan do with geolocation data.These are still small steps, thoughand they are happening as increasingly pervasive and powerful technologies collect more data than ever. And at the same time, Washington is preparing for a new presidential administration that has attacked the press and other critics, promised to target immigrants for mass deportation, threatened to seek retribution against perceived enemies, and supported restrictive state abortion laws. This is not even to mention the increased collection of our biometric data, especially for facial recognition, and the normalization of its use in all kinds of ways. In this light, its no stretch to say our personal data has arguably never been more vulnerable, and the imperative for privacy has never felt more urgent.So what can Americans expect for their personal data in 2025? We spoke to privacy experts and advocates about (some of) whats on their mind regarding how our digital data might be traded or protected moving forward.Reining in a problematic industryIn early December, the Federal Trade Commission announced separate settlement agreements with the data brokers Mobilewalla and Gravy Analytics (and its subsidiary Venntel). Finding that the companies had tracked and sold geolocation data from users at sensitive locations like churches, hospitals, and military installations without explicit consent, the FTC banned the companies from selling such data except in specific circumstances. This follows something of a busy year in regulation of data brokers, including multiple FTC enforcement actions against other companies for similar use and sale of geolocation data, as well as a proposed rule from the Justice Department that would prohibit the sale of bulk data to foreign entities.And on the same day that the FTC announced these settlements in December, the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau proposed a new rule that would designate data brokers as consumer reporting agencies, which would trigger stringent reporting requirements and consumer privacy protections. The rule would prohibit the collection and sharing of peoples sensitive information, such as their salaries and Social Security numbers, without legitimate purposes. While the rule will still need to undergo a 90-day public comment period, and its unclear whether it will move forward under the Trump administration, if its finalized it has the power to fundamentally limit how data brokers do business.Right now, there just arent many limits on how these companies operatenor, for that matter, clear information on how many data brokerages even exist. Industry watchers estimate there may be 4,000 to 5,000 data brokers around the world, many of which weve never heard ofand whose names constantly shift. In California alone, the states 2024 Data Broker Registry lists 527 such businesses that have voluntarily registered there, nearly 90 of which also self-reported that they collect geolocation data.All this data is widely available for purchase by anyone who will pay. Marketers buy data to create highly targeted advertisements, and banks and insurance companies do the same to verify identity, prevent fraud, and conduct risk assessments. Law enforcement buys geolocation data to track peoples whereabouts without getting traditional search warrants. Foreign entities can also currently buy sensitive information on members of the military and other government officials. And on people-finder websites, basically anyone can pay for anyone elses contact details and personal history.Data brokers and their clients defend these transactions by saying that most of this data is anonymizedthough its questionable whether that can truly be done in the case of geolocation data. Besides, anonymous data can be easily reidentified, especially when its combined with other personal information.Digital-rights advocates have spent years sounding the alarm on this secretive industry, especially the ways in which it can harm already marginalized communities, though various types of data collection have sparked consternation across the political spectrum. Representative Cathy McMorris Rodgers, the Republican chair of the House Energy and Commerce Committee, for example, was concerned about how the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention bought location data to evaluate the effectiveness of pandemic lockdowns. Then a study from last year showed how easy (and cheap) it was to buy sensitive data about members of the US military; Senator Elizabeth Warren, a Democrat, called out the national security risks of data brokers in a statement to MIT Technology Review, and Senator John Cornyn, a Republican, later said he was shocked when he read about the practice in our story.But it was the 2022 Supreme Court decision ending the constitutional guarantee of legal abortion that spurred much of the federal action last year. Shortly after the Dobbs ruling, President Biden issued an executive order to protect access to reproductive health care; it included instructions for the FTC to take steps preventing information about visits to doctors offices or abortion clinics from being sold to law enforcement agencies or state prosecutors.The new enforcersWith Donald Trump taking office in January, and Republicans taking control of both houses of Congress, the fate of the CFPBs proposed ruleand the CFPB itselfis uncertain. Republicans, the people behind Project 2025, and Elon Musk (who will lead the newly created advisory group known as the Department of Government Efficiency) have long been interested in seeing the bureau deleted, as Musk put it on X. That would take an act of Congress, making it unlikely, but there are other ways that the administration could severely curtail its powers. Trump is likely to fire the current director and install a Republican who could rescind existing CFPB rules and stop any proposed rules from moving forward.Meanwhile, the FTCs enforcement actions are only as good as the enforcers. FTC decisions do not set legal precedent in quite the same way that court cases do, says Ben Winters, a former Department of Justice official and the director of AI and privacy at the Consumer Federation of America, a network of organizations and agencies focused on consumer protection. Instead, they require consistent [and] additional enforcement to make the whole industry scared of not having an FTC enforcement action against them. (Its also worth noting that these FTC settlements are specifically focused on geolocation data, which is just one of the many types of sensitive data that we regularly give up in order to participate in the digital world.)Looking ahead, Tiffany Li, a professor at the University of San Francisco School of Law who focuses on AI and privacy law, is worried about a defanged FTC that she says would be less aggressive in taking action against companies.Lina Khan, the current FTC chair, has been the leader of privacy protection action in the US, notes Li, and shell soon be leaving. Andrew Ferguson, Trumps recently named pick to be the next FTC chair, has come out in strong opposition to data brokers: This type of datarecords of a persons precise physical locationsis inherently intrusive and revealing of peoples most private affairs, he wrote in a statement on the Mobilewalla decision, indicating that he is likely to continue action against them. (Ferguson has been serving as a commissioner on the FTC since April 20214.) On the other hand, he has spoken out against using FTC actions as an alternative to privacy legislation passed by Congress. And, of course, this brings us right back around to that other major roadblock: Congress has so far failed to pass such lawsand its unclear if the next Congress will either.Movement in the statesWithout federal legislative action, many US states are taking privacy matters into their own hands.In 2025, eight new state privacy laws will take effect, making a total of 25 around the country. A number of other stateslike Vermont and Massachusettsare considering passing their own privacy bills next year, and such laws could, in theory, force national legislation, says Woodrow Hartzog, a technology law scholar at Boston University School of Law. Right now, the statutes are all similar enough that the compliance cost is perhaps expensive but manageable, he explains. But if one state passed a law that was different enough from the others, a national law could be the only way to resolve the conflict. Additionally, four statesCalifornia, Texas, Vermont, and Oregonalready have specific laws regulating data brokers, including the requirement that they register with the state.Along with new laws, says Justin Brookman, the director of technology policy at Consumer Reports, comes the possibility that we can put some more teeth on these laws.Brookman points to Texas, where some of the most aggressive enforcement action at the state level has taken place under its Republican attorney general, Ken Paxton. Even before the states new consumer privacy bill went into effect in July, Paxton announced the creation of a special task force focused on enforcing the states privacy laws. He has since targeted a number of data brokersincluding National Public Data, which exposed millions of sensitive customer records in a data breach in August, as well as companies that sell to them, like Sirius XM.At the same time, though, Paxton has moved to enforce the states strict abortion laws in ways that threaten individual privacy. In December, he sued a New York doctor for sending abortion pills to a Texas woman through the mail. While the doctor is theoretically protected by New Yorks shield laws, which provide a safeguard from out-of-state prosecution, Paxtons aggressive action makes it even more crucial that states enshrine data privacy protections into their laws, says Albert Fox Cahn, the executive director of the Surveillance Technology Oversight Project, an advocacy group. There is an urgent need for states, he says, to lock down our residents data, barring companies from collecting and sharing information in ways that can be weaponized against them by out-of-state prosecutors.Data collection in the name of securityWhile privacy has become a bipartisan issue, Republicans, in particular, are interested in addressing data brokers in the context of national security, such as protecting the data of military members or other government officials, says Winters. But in his view, its the effects on reproductive rights and immigrants that are potentially the most dangerous threats to privacy.Indeed, data brokers (including Venntel, the Gravy Analytics subsidiary named in the recent FTC settlement) have sold cell-phone data to Immigration and Customs Enforcement, as well as to Customs and Border Protection. That data has then been used to track individuals for deportation proceedingsallowing the agencies to bypass local and state sanctuary laws that ban local law enforcement from sharing information for immigration enforcement.The more data that corporations collect, the more data thats available to governments for surveillance, warns Ashley Gorski, a senior attorney who works on national security and privacy at the American Civil Liberties Union.The ACLU is among a number of organizations that have been pushing for the passage of another federal law related to privacy: the Fourth Amendment Is Not For Sale Act. It would close the so-called data-broker loophole that allows law enforcement and intelligence agencies to buy personal information from data brokers without a search warrant. The bill would dramatically limit the ability of the government to buy Americans private data, Gorski says. It was first introduced in 2021 and passed the House in April 2024, with the support of 123 Republicans and 93 Democrats, before stalling in the Senate.While Gorski is hopeful that the bill will move forward in the next Congress, others are less sanguine about these prospectsand alarmed about other ways that the incoming administration might co-opt private systems for surveillance purposes, as Hartzog puts it. So much of our personal information that is collected for one purpose, he says, could easily be used by the government to track us.This is especially concerning, adds Winters, given that the next administration has been very explicit about wanting to use every tool at its disposal to carry out policies like mass deportations and to exact revenge on perceived enemies. And one possible change, he says, is as simple as loosening the governments procurement processes to make them more open to emerging technologies, which may have fewer privacy protections. Right now, its annoying to procure anything as a federal agency, he says, but he expects a more fast and loose use of commercial tools.Thats something weve [already] seen a lot, he adds, pointing to federal, state, and local agencies using the Clearviews of the worlda reference to the controversial facial recognition company.The AI wild cardUnderlying all of these debates on potential legislation is the fact that technology companiesespecially AI companiescontinue to require reams and reams of data, including personal data, to train their machine-learning models. And theyre quickly running out of it.This is something of a wild card in any predictions about personal data. Ideally, says Jennifer King, a privacy and data policy fellow at the Stanford Institute for Human-Centered Artificial Intelligence, the shortage would lead to ways for consumers to directly benefit, perhaps financially, from the value of their own data. But its more likely that there will be more industry resistance against some of the proposed comprehensive federal privacy legislation bills, she says. Companies benefit from the status quo.The hunt for more and more data may also push companies to change their own privacy policies, says Whitney Merrill, a former FTC official who works on data privacy at Asana. Speaking in a personal capacity, she says that companies have felt the squeeze in the tech recession that were in, with the high interest rates, and that under those circumstances, weve seen people turn around, change their policies, and try to monetize their data in an AI worldeven if its at the expense of user privacy. She points to the $60-million-per-year deal that Reddit struck last year to license its content to Google to help train the companys AI.Earlier this year, the FTC warned companies that it would be unfair and deceptive to surreptitiously change their privacy policies to allow for the use of user data to train AI. But again, whether or not officials follow up on this depends on those in charge.So what will privacy look like in 2025?While the recent FTC settlements and the CFPBs proposed rule represent important steps forward in privacy protectionat least when it comes to geolocation dataAmericans personal information still remains widely available and vulnerable.Rebecca Williams, a senior strategist at the ACLU for privacy and data governance, argues that all of us, as individuals and communities, should take it upon ourselves to do more to protect ourselves and resist by opting out of as much data collection as possible. That means checking privacy settings on accounts and apps, and using encrypted messaging services.Cahn, meanwhile, says hell be striving to protect [his] local community, working to enact safeguards to ensure that we live up to our principles and stated commitments. One example of such safeguards is a proposed New York City ordinance that would ban the sharing of any location data originating from within the city limits. Hartzog says that kind of local activism has already been effective in pushing for city bans on facial recognition.Privacy rights are at risk, but theyre not gone, and its not helpful to take an overly pessimistic look right now, says Li, the USF law professor. We definitely still have privacy rights, and the more that we continue to fight for these rights, the more were going to be able to protect our rights.
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