Since the start of the new year, California internet surfers may have noticed a new pop-up when opening a webpage: “Do Not Sell My Personal Info.”
The California Consumer Privacy Act (CCPA) grants users the right to request a list of the personal data a company has stored and which third-party vendors the information is shared with. The law also allows consumers to opt out of letting businesses sell their data and request for businesses to delete their information.
Regulation for the CCPA is sporadic; California’s attorney general will conduct only three enforcement actions per year, according to NPR.
Additionally, the law does not stop businesses from collecting your data in the first place. In order to access your private information, opt out of it being sold, or request a business to delete your information, you would have to reach out to every individual company whose website you have ever accessed.
While the CCPA is a step in the right direction for a safer digital world, it places the burden on an often unaware consumer to opt out.
It is possible companies have access to your creditworthiness, your physical mailing address, your order at a restaurant you visited three years ago or the in-app messages you sent to an Airbnb host, according to The New York Times.
As consumers, we need to be aware of the personal data available to companies and take advantage of the rights the CCPA protects.
Technology is evolving rapidly, and regulation can’t keep up.
We make a trade-off when we sign up for technology. We get free content in exchange for our data. But this deal is nefarious if we don’t know about it.
The Snowden revelations uncovered data breaches in 2013. The Cambridge Analytica scandal revealed more in 2018. It happened then, and it can happen again.
It is more important now than ever to protect your data privacy.
You wouldn’t hand out slips of paper with your full name, phone number and address to strangers on the street. So why let companies sell — and potentially misuse — all of this and more?
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Email Vernie Covarrubias: vernetta.covarrubias@pepperdine.edu
