Episode Details

Privacy has been defined in many ways. The right to tell your story your own way. The right to have control over your personal information. The right to be left alone. There’s a reason we have T-shirts that say “dance like no one is watching”. We censor ourselves when we’re being watched. But if knowledge is power, then asymmetries in knowledge must lead to asymmetries in power. Privacy is a human right but it’s also a collective good – something we need to respect and support, even if we do not personally feel the need to exercise it. Today I’ll explore why privacy is essential, how it is being threatened, and what we can do to reclaim it with Carissa Véliz, a professor of philosophy and author of the wonderful and important book, Privacy is Power.

Interview Notes

• Carissa’s website: https://www.carissaveliz.com/
• Privacy is Power: https://www.penguinrandomhouse.com/books/673341/privacy-is-power-by-carissa-veliz/ 
• My review of her book: https://firewallsdontstopdragons.com/privacy-is-power-review/ 
• The Ethics of Privacy and Surveillance: https://www.oxford-aiethics.ox.ac.uk/blog/new-book-ethics-privacy-and-surveillance 
• TEDx: The Case for Ending Data Economy: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=luCXlPYrTP4 
• Google’s Don’t Be Evil motto history:  https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Don’t_be_evil 
• Give Thanks & Donate! https://firewallsdontstopdragons.com/give-thanks-donate/ 

Further Info

• Help me reach more people! https://fdsd.me/awareness2
• Send me your questions! https://fdsd.me/qna 
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• Generate secure passphrases! https://d20key.com/#/ 

Table of Contents

Use these timestamps to jump to a particular section of the show.

• 0:00:31: Give Thanks & Donate!
• 0:01:27: Follow me on Bluesky
• 0:02:06: Interview setup
• 0:04:17: What inspired you to write this book?
• 0:07:04: What impacts has your book had? Did any response surprise you?
• 0:10:01: When researching the book, what surveillance methods most surprised you?
• 0:13:31: How and when did all this surveillance start?
• 0:15:40: Are behavior ads really more effective than contextual ads?
• 0:19:04: Is it possible to have privacy and still target ads?
• 0:22:08: What’s your take on Google’s Privacy Sandbox concept?
• 0:23:57: Why is the ‘notice and consent’ model such a failure?
• 0:28:14: What’s your ta