Facebook is buying WhatsApp. This resonates in the digital economy, and it is a black day for privacy. It’s like two data-octopi got married and had a data-octopus child. With 16 arms.
Zuckerberg has been quoted as saying there were several ways to make money from text messaging services. Advertising was not an option. Instead, Facebook would rather make money off of user data. Both companies have piled up gigantic masses of data — the combination of the two services allows for user profiles that could hardly be more accurate.
Besides marketing agents, intelligence services are also interested in the data. And Facebook, at least, has had to send data to the NSA multiple times in the past.
WhatsApp saves telephone data and contacts. Additionally, the app can access hardware—the microphone and camera. This makes smartphones theoretically able to morph into bugging devices without the knowledge of the user. Orwell could not have thought it out better.
Users who don’t want all of their small talk saved on NSA servers are nevertheless far from helpless. There are alternatives.
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