Data Brokers Broke My Trust

     We've all heard the C.S. Lewis quote "Integrity is doing the right thing when no one is watching." In fact, if you've ever spent any time inside an elementary, middle, or high school classroom, you've probably seen a sign or two about it. If Lewis is right, and doing the right thing when no one is watching is what defines integrity, then data brokers dug a hole, tossed in their integrity, filled the hole, jumped on it a few times, and then spat on it. Essentially, they have no integrity.
     Being a data broker is based solely on doing the wrong thing when no one is looking: data mining. And because there are few rules and no laws to enforce ethically correct behavior, these data brokers are able to continue essentially stealing information from consumers. Not cool. This behavior is what breaks the trust of consumers, making them fear the internet.
     Why should consumers' trust be broken? Oh, maybe because data brokers sell things such as region, education, travel data, and the Social Security Numbers (!!!) of consumers. Who do they sell it to? Pretty much anyone, including hotels, jewelry stores, airlines, colleges, retail chains, law enforcement, advertising agencies, other data brokers, and, oh yeah, the government (Fernbeck). Trust broken now? Starting to feel a little paranoid every time you visit a website or search amazon for a product? Ready to go hide in a cave with zero technology or cell signal and live off the wild for the rest of your life? I'm right there with you.
     Luckily, it's not entirely hopeless. I know, right now you feel like Han Solo after Boba Fett tricks him and he ends up being frozen in carbonate (shiver), Boba Fett being the Data Brokers and Han Solo the unsuspecting consumer. But there is hope Luke can come and save you! Hope in the form of a proposed Fair Information Practices (FIP) checklist to keep data brokers ethical. Currently, these guidelines aren't enforceable by law, but hopefully that would change.
     One of the new guidelines included would be "harm": an ethical standpoint to make sure the consumers aren't involved in any " consequences resulting from the dissemination of false or wrong data" (Fernbeck). This, among several other guidelines (such as fairness, trust, respect, and privacy) would hopefully keep data brokers ethical.
     Now, unless these guidelines go into action and are legally enforced, there's not really much anyone can do to stop data brokers, except hiding in a tech-free wilderness (which, let's face it, no matter how paranoid we are, we couldn't actually do). So for now, all we can do is be smart about what information we put online, be sparse with information, and remember that it is likely that everything we do online is being catalogued and sold to someone. Hey, at least you know someone, somewhere, cares about your personal information you!
     Until there is some real, desperately needed, reforms in the data mining industry, data brokers will not change their ways and will continue to behave unethically. So,  I'd like to leave a message to data brokers from my old classrooms and C.S. Lewis:

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