The Great Hack

"How we went about testing these questions and what we found may astound you. Our planned two-week investigation into the psychology of prison life had to be ended after only six days because of what the situation was doing to the college students who participated. In only a few days, our guards became sadistic and our prisoners became depressed and showed signs of extreme stress. Please read the story of what happened and what it tells us about the nature of human nature."

PHILIPZIMBARDO

I found The Great Hack on Netfilx. Somebody mentioned it when we were talking about the need the world needs to have free internet to provide education opportunities for all, and one of the people that was on the conversation brought it up. I, being the Cassandra I am, ran to put it in my queue and watched it while having some popcorn. Halfway through, the popcorn was almost intact and I was glued to the TV. The more I watched, the more I was reminded of the Stanford Prison Experiment, because the expansion of social networking has proven to be a huge social experiment. An experiment that has showed us how flawed and gullible we are.

The thing is, for all the time I seem to spend online, I am notoriously recalcitrant about giving any of the tech giants too much info about myself. I cover my laptop camera and I refuse to give too much info to any new app or media giant. I take quizzes online but never email them to myself. I have a Twitter account that has seen very little movement because I use it as a news aggregator. Same with IG. I don't have LinkedIn. I don't have Facebook. I don't have Alexa at home. I have to authorize my phone each time I want to access one of my pics when I chat with my sister on an app, because they have geolocation activated while using the apps. I did give info to Google when I opened this account years ago but I try to limit the info I give to google, too. I use DuckDuckGo instead of other search engines. I watch porn on incognito windows. Yeah, it seems like a lot of work. But it makes me feel a little better. 

And after watching The Great Hack, and hearing how Cambridge Analytica used people's data to alter people's opinions and ultimately influence an election result, I feel better about being a slightly paranoid bitch. The Great Hack reminded me of the Stanford Prison experiment, where 'good people' (your family and 'friends') are put in an evil place through manipulation of their own data. You see, Cambridge Analytica used those little personality tests on Facebook (What Disney Villain are You?), for example, to extract data from your sweet aunt Doris, who uses Facebook to stay in touch with her nieces and nephews and it used that data to persuade her to change her view of the election process. Yep, that's why she went from the adorable lady who likes Better Homes and Gardens to the gorgon who had an Agolf Twiler sign in her yard and talks shit about that 'communist' Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez.

Cambridge Analytica extracted about 5,000 data points of information from the millions of people on its database and used it to sway their perceptions of the world around them. Helped by Facebook. And the AI specifically did not go for people who had their minds already made, it went for the 'persuadables': those people it identified as being 'on the fence' or who showed they believed what they read online without questioning it. Cambridge Analytica chose the Republicans because they showed they believed everything they saw online without confirming it (Q-Anon, anyone?). And where did they get the data? From your sweet aunt, of course. She GAVE it to them. Data is the currency that Facebook, LinkedIn, Twitter, Instagram, Google and any other tech giant deals with. Nothing is free. We are the product.

So next time somebody asks you if you turn off Alexa while you do the dirty and you say no, don't be surprised if a new brand of lube appears on your ads when you're surfing the web looking for restaurants. You gave Alexa the data. She's just using it. 

XOXO