Asserting the 2023 Scholarship Winner

We’d prefer to say thanks to all those that took the time to submit purposes for our scholarship. After fastidiously reviewing all of them, we’re happy to announce the winner of our 2023 scholarship.

Gabriel Monahan

Congratulations! Gabriel is attending Louisiana State College and Agricultural & Mechanical School.

In his essay, Gabriel explains what he believes must be outlawed in america, which he has agreed to have revealed under. We invite you to learn it.

Think about if somebody had unrestricted entry to your present location, each bank card buy you could have made, and each Google search question you could have entered. Utilizing this info, they deduced particulars about your profession, hobbies, and even your family, then proceeded to promote this info. Would this not be an utmost invasion of your privateness and rights? Maybe a singular individual will not be doing it, however company conglomerates in tech are. Coined by Shoshana Zuboff, Surveillance Capitalism refers to large tech corporations monetizing the information of their customers by way of monitoring and amassing all interpretable info from gadgets. Though at present authorized, Surveillance Capitalism is a blatant violation of privateness that must be outlawed in america.

In at this time’s interconnected world, knowledge has turn into value extra its digital weight in gold, closely coveted by advertisers and different entities. Huge tech corporations are greater than keen to promote this knowledge, exploiting obscure “knowledgeable consent” agreements that usually make the gadget or program unusable if declined. Nonetheless, these agreements merely disclose the gathering of information with out explicitly stating will probably be made right into a marketable good (Andrew & Baker, 2021; Zuboff & Schwandt, 2019). Very similar to within the Industrial Revolution the place the preliminary lack of labor legal guidelines created obscenities of nice proportion, the fashionable Technological Revolution has gone largely unchecked by regulatory measures. Customers not solely function the manufacturing unit employees but additionally the uncooked materials itself, as their generated knowledge is transformed into worthwhile items. Whereas initially tech corporations bought knowledge solely to advertisers, the clientele has expanded to any entity concerned about digital behavioral knowledge (Zuboff & Schwandt, 2019). Zuboff predicts that if Surveillance Capitalism continues unimpeded, residents will forfeit the flexibility to manage their digital lives and Monahan 2 autonomy, in flip ending the standard proper to privateness as society is aware of it (Zuboff & Schwandt, 2019).

The Fb-Cambridge Analytica knowledge scandal of 2018 introduced the legality of mass-scale knowledge assortment and distribution into the highlight. Subsequently, authorities consideration in direction of the difficulty elevated, resulting in the passage of the Normal Information Safety Rules by the European Union (Marelli & Testa, 2018). Prohibiting the acquisition of shopper knowledge by way of laws poses a substantial problem. Present legal guidelines in america emphasize particular person privateness however are ill-defined, failing to guard towards the commodification of persona knowledge (Andrew & Baker, 2021). Alex Mcdougall, co-founder of enterprise capital agency Bicameral Ventures asserts that enormous tech corporations function in a digital world that’s inadequately outlined by legal guidelines, making a “basic mismatch of privateness and revenue” (Mcdougall, 2020). The transformation of our world into a fancy, interconnected panorama by way of fashionable expertise and the web necessitates equally subtle authorized frameworks. It’s crucial that Surveillance Capitalism be outlawed in america to guard residents from the unauthorized acquisition and monetization of their private knowledge.

-By Gabriel Monahan