3 Ways to Exercise Your Right to Privacy

Life, liberty, and the pursuit of privacy.

Many people don’t know their rights when it comes to privacy online.
Misunderstanding your rights could end up leaving your personal information available without your consent.
Use the information we discuss in exercise your right to privacy today.

A New Digital World

When everyday people like us began to use the internet, the rules we have today surrounding usage did not exist. Zero borders and no regulation left it open to anyone who chose to use it.

After a while, the lack of order on the internet became concerning to big companies and government organizations. While they understood how the physical world worked, this new digital world was very unknown.

As these organizations began to explore the digital world to try to understand it, the digital world started to reflect the physical world within that country. For example, a country that had very strict regulations on products and services started to apply the same regulations to the digital world.

Who Should Access Your Information

In the last couple of years, people came to ask questions about these regulations and how they affect their rights and privacy. Questions like, “Should the government and certain companies have access to your virtual communication without your consent?”

Big companies like Apple and Google have had to think through these important questions and how they can protect their consumers.

They understand the potential importance of giving access to consumer communication for criminal investigation purposes, but they also know that when they create a backdoor, people will try to use it. This could be another back door for hackers to access your information.

Different countries have different regulations when it comes to privacy. It’s important to understand that if we want to open the door for companies and the government to gain access to virtual communication, we are trading in our privacy. Are you willing to trade your privacy for safety?

Net Neutrality and your ISP

Net neutrality is the idea that broadband internet service providers should treat all traffic on their network equally. Prior to current legislation, the delivery of content was not regulated. This meant that internet service providers could block, slow down or speed up the delivery of online content for different reasons.

Net neutrality legislation was introduced at the state level in 2018. This means that the government regulates the internet like other public utility services.

Under net neutrality internet services, providers can no longer discriminate which services are available to the consumer. However, different states carry different requirements when it comes to net neutrality and your ISP using your personal data.

There are still some states that do not require your ISP to have consent before sharing or selling your browsing data.

Protect Yourself

There are still ways you can protect yourself. We know most people do not read through Privacy Policies. They often assume their privacy is protected. But, as we discussed above, that is not always the case.

Whether your ISP needs consent or not there are still ways you can protect yourself.

Here are three ways you can ensure your privacy today:

Read about the laws and regulations for your state here.
Find out your browser’s privacy settings and use them. Check out this article for tips based on your browser.
Take advantage of the privacy settings on your mobile device.