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How do i convince my brother privacy is important?

My brother seems to not care about his online privacy. He registers to services too easily without pondering, he’s not outraged we need a fucking account to use a vacuum cleaner, it seems he doesn’t care about all the potential risks of having videos of our indoors saved in a cloud. I don’t have strong arguments to convince him that privacy matters other than “if someone gets that, you could be in trouble” and “it’s like having someone watching you h24” and so on. How can i persuade him?

39 comments
  • You can't. As more generations are born into a world where 24 hour a day surveillance, constant data tracking, and a monthly subscription for literally everything are the norms the expectation of any kind of privacy will sound like something from a history book.

    Soon it will seem odd to people that anyone wouldn't want every thought and action to be tracked and recorded by our corporate overlords. People who try to maintain any type of real privacy will be seen as misanthropic at best or highly suspicious at worst.

  • Most people aren't ready to accept the message of privacy importance. I would say that's the vast majority actually. Many in my family throw all sorts of personal information into "online contests and signups".

    Privacy now is like climate change was 20 years ago.....incredibly important, but hasn't come to the forefront for most people, governments, etc. Say your message politely and only when welcomed, and otherwise leave people to make their decisions.

    If you're actually interested in changing people's minds, it is an incredibly difficult and complex process, but you can start learning about it. Here's an author whose podcast I follow and he's doing really good work on the subject:

    https://www.theguardian.com/books/2022/jun/09/how-minds-change-by-david-mcraney-review

    A lot of other comments talk about hitting him with some bullshit " gatcha" or some variation of scolding......which is all bullshit and counterproductive.

  • You don't

    Privacy is something that is fairly personal and different for each person. Trying to force it one someone is going to end badly and will not help at all.

  • I would refer to the recent FTC questions to "algorithmic pricing practices". Long story short it was about some companies are using browser data, accounts data, etc. for "smart" pricing. Your brother may not care about someone watching him but I don't think he wants to pay for the same goods more than others.

  • Some time ago, concerned with toxicity on their World of Warcraft forums, Blizzard Entertainment decided to implement a "RealID" system which would attach the customer's real name from their records to their forum post. In a sort of "self immolation" protest to show Blizzard how absolutely terrible the idea was, myself and a few others posted our own names willingly before the new system was implemented. It was predictably bad as you might imagine and the plans were scrapped entirely.

  • I think, when you explain things to people (i.e. in instances where it's not an absence of knowledge that's the problem), the vast majority of people know we're correct, but are held back by convenience. They're embedded into the Google ecosystem or whatever, and it is a pain in the ass to migrate. There are many popular services for which there isn't a 1:1 private alternative. I can openly and confidently say that I sacrifice some convenience for privacy, and to me it is worth it. But other people, while they agree that they don't like being spied on, are used to being spied on and therefore have a "if it ain't broke don't fix it" attitude. They're already using spyware and it's not had an immediately obvious acute consequence for them, so there's not really any turning point at which they would go "this is enough" and change.

    I think so long as they're aware, if they do value privacy, over time they should slowly replace the things they use. Also, some of my friends get Signal just to speak to me since I'm not really on anything else (unless they want to email me lol), so that kind of effect may push them in the right direction.

    If your brother doesn't care though, he just doesn't care. Privacy is actually very straightforward: it's creepy for someone to be spying on me and watching my every move, therefore I take precautions to make that difficult for people wanting to spy on me. You don't need to convince people that being spied on is creepy. They know that, and are stopped by inertia, which they can only overcome on their own. I don't think it's worth nagging them about it when they already know what is to be known.

  • It depends on the kind of risks you have in mind.

    Are you worried about someone hacking an account, stealing passwords and committing identity theft? If so, the stakes are pretty high, but the probability is low as long as your brother takes care of updates and passwords. Also, avoiding shady software and sites helps too. I prefer to call this category security, but it certainly has privacy aspects too. IMO online security should be a high priority.

    However, if you’re mainly concerned about Amazon, Meta, Microsoft, Google and other companies collecting data about you, the situation is very different. I call this thing privacy, and the risks are smaller, but the probability is very high.

    When it comes to security, you just need to show what has happened to other people who screwed up and made themselves an easy target. However, privacy is a bit trickier. Appreciation of privacy is a more philosophical matter, since the practical side of it isn’t as tangible. If your brother doesn’t have certain values, principles or philosophy, it’s going to be difficult to convince him that privacy matters.

    If your brother already takes good care of online security, but ignores privacy, you could talk about the way companies use your data. Focus on the ethical side of these practices. If not, forget about privacy and focus on security instead, since that should always be the higher priority.

  • Start doing browser research like this:

    Most poison substances

    How to fake a suicide letter

    Cain was right killing Abel

    Parents reaction to the death of a son

    ecc...

    At the very least next time he spy on you he will freak out 💁‍♂️

  • Post his social security number online, next to a scan of his photo ID. He'll realize the importance of privacy in a few months.

39 comments