Data privacy: how to counter the "I have nothing to hide" argument?
I know data privacy is important and I know that big corporations like Meta became powerful enough to even manipulate elections using our data.
But, when I talk to people in general, most seem to not worry because they “have nothing to hide”, and most are only worried about their passwords, banking apps and not much else.
So, why should people worry about data privacy even if they have “nothing to hide”?
Not the only response but I haven’t seen it in the comments and it’s a simple answer without room for a semantic argument. People with that kind of attitude will often be dismissive of any response over three words in my experience 😂
Even if you have nothing to hide yourself (which, as other commenters said, is very unlikely), and can be certain you’ll never have anything to hide ever (even less probable), there will be other people who do have something to hide. That does not mean they are evil (though some are) - maybe they are fighting for a cause, or maybe they are persecuted minorities, or maybe governments and/or powerful organizations will want to bring them harm.
These people, being mere humans, have some minor secrets in their past or present that can be signal-boosted by a malevolent agent to seriously hurt them, their reputation, and/or their social standing. And even if they did mange to obtain the level of sainthood that the have-noving-to-hide folks seem to possess - their perfectly normative personal information can still be used to dox them or retaliate against them in some other way.
If you care about these people and/or any cause they may be fighting for, then you don’t want them to be the only ones who demand privacy. Because:
They will effectively be holding a big “I have something to hide” signs, being the only ones that opt to protect their privacy.
Governments and companies will have an easy job giving them very small privacy protection, if at all, since there will be no pressure from the general public for privacy protection.
This will make it much easier to persecute minorities and to retaliate against activists, making society as a whole much worse for everyone.
I wonder if websites like Pornhub have enough dirt on foreign officials that they could change international policy. Maybe the great unification of nations will be started by Pornhub.
I was really interested coming into this thread, because although I am conscious about privacy I sometimes wonder why I bother.
Unfortunately none of the counterarguments in the comments are convincing at all.
Analogies with letting someone see you naked are stupid. We’re not talking about naked photos, were talking about stuff like your age range and what newspaper you read. I don’t care who knows that.
“Future authoritarian governments could use it against you” isn’t worth worrying about. The government will have access to official records and can question you in person. Your ethnicity, religion, politics and sexuality are all easily found out whether you post them online or not. The fact that some advertising start up knows them will make no difference.
“If someone knows enough about you they can tailor Facebook ads to control your mind” is just sci fi conspiracy theory paranoia. Besides which they could run the same ads without targeting and I’d be just as mind controlled even if my data was a secret.
Edit: I really don’t mind getting downvotes, but if anyone has time to make an actual counterargument that would be great
I like to say something along the lines of this “Why do you close the door when you use the restroom? You don’t have anything to hide right? It’s only natural what you’re doing in there. It’s because you want privacy and the same goes for your data online.”
Ask the person telling you that to describe in detail the last time they were intimate with someone and their security information for their bank account. Then when they are confused and upset repeat “got nothing to hide nothing to fear right?”
You absolutely have data to hide. Data that can be used to rob your identity like your birth date and SSN, your financial statements that can make you the target of criminals, your various usernames and passwords, your medical history, etc. Next time they tell you this argument, ask them for this data since “they have nothing to hide”, and if they give it to you, you will know they are complete idiots whom you should probably move away from.
In the 1930s, the Netherlands kept detailed records of ethnicity for every citizen. No one thought this was unnecessary, as ethnicity wasn’t something that could ever be used against you.
That line of thought ended when the Germans took over in may 1940. Unfortunately those records still existed, and aided the most efficient genocide in human history. Without those records, many jews, sinti and Roma would’ve been able to deny their ancestry and evade being murdered.
Privacy from government and corporations will one day save lives.
Realistically there isn’t one. People dropping that argument are not interested in a dialectic.
It ultimately doesn’t matter if you have nothing to hide. Some people do and have good, ethical, reason to. Universal privacy is the only way to ensure necessary privacy.
What counters it is the fact that you might not have anything to hide now but you might have to hide something in the future. Circumstances might change, your country might turn into an authoritarian dictatorship over time, that declares a quality or behavior of yours to be illegal. They can and will use all your data against you to prosecute you.
I use a monetary argument… If my data can become revenue to the company then I must have a part of this revenue …if they are not paying me for my property (my data) then I should keep my data from them
Additionally, and more deleterious, if a company knows you’re looking to take a vacation, or to buy new shoes, they can increase the price that is served to you across all of your internet searches. This is the counter to the privacy argument which separates automated/computer knowledge vs personal knowledge. It’s one thing for someone to be reading all of my Gmail, which is creepy and invasive, vs Alphabet scanning my email and building a consumer profile on me so that all of my searches are tagged and referenced to extract maximum value from my online purchases, which isn’t creepy or invasive (imho) but may materially affect my quality of live which is bad in a totally different way.
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