Should companies collect information about you? 200 words
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Answer:
Did you know that Google has personal information about you like: all your google searches, chats, emails, and recordings of your google voice calls (Ghitis, “Google Knows)? Companies like Google, Facebook, and Twitter should not be trusted to have access to all sorts of data. Corporations also collect other private data like names, ages, and genders (“Twitter Privacy Policy”). They should not be able to collect facts about people because they are invading people’s privacy, information bought from data brokers can be used to harm others, and many cases of identity theft can occur.
Collecting personal data about people is an invasion of privacy. Certain personal info such as birthday, age, ...view middle of the document...
Acxiom, the biggest data broker company, has over 1,500 facts about over 200 million Americans (Kroft, “The Data Brokers: Selling Your Personal Information). Acxiom can give these details to almost any company. According to Michael McFarland, in 1978, “20 percent of the criminal history records given out by the states went to private corporations and government agencies not involved in criminal justice” (“Unauthorized Transmission and Use of Personal Data”). This is true; for example, businesses looking to hire new employees can do lengthy background checks. Since this data can be accessed by any company who purchases the data, you could be in danger. Employees with bad intentions could track you down and harm you.
Identity theft is a major issue in today’s society. According to the Identity Theft Assistance Center, who recently published a study conducted by Javelin Strategy & Research, found that in 2012, there were over 12.6 million people in the US whose identities were stolen (“Research and Statistics”). This means that one identity was stolen approximately every 3 seconds in 2012 (“Research and Statistics”). You or anyone you know could have easily been one of those 12.6 million people. Your entire life savings can we wiped out of accounts because social security numbers and other information are available to certain people. If these facts was not easily accessible, you could certainly prevent some cases of identity theft.
When all of the effects are taken into consideration, you will realize that companies do need to stop collecting so much data. Corporations have so much information that people consider it as an invasion of privacy. Also, these details are sold, so basically anyone can access it and harm you, or steal your identity. The University of Wisconsin-Madison published an article on how to prevent companies from tracking you using three easy steps: use Ghostery (a tool that can prevent businesses from seeing what sites you have visited), go to DuckDuckGo.com (a search engine that does not keep a record of what sites you have visited), and to enable the “Do Not Track” option in your web browser privacy settings (“Websites Are Collecting Your Personal Data, 3 Steps to Stop Them”). If you do not take these steps, you could certainly become a victim of identity theft or have to live with the fact that your private information is being sold.
Works Cited
Doyne, Shannon. “Should Companies Collect Information About You?” The New York Times.