Every day, corporations track our movements through license plate scanners, building detailed profiles of where we go, when we go there, and who we visit. When they do this to us in violation of data privacy laws, we've suffered a real harm-period. We shouldn't need to prove we've suffered additional damage, such as physical injury or monetary loss, to have our day in court.
"This decision misunderstands how our products work, and we will appeal it," Google spokesman Jose Castaneda said Thursday. "Our privacy tools give people control over their data, and when they turn off personalization, we honor that choice."
The complaint from Charles Borges, the chief data officer at the SSA, alleges that Doge staffers effectively created a live copy of the entire country's social security data from its numerical identification system database. The information is a goldmine for bad actors, the complaint alleges, and was placed on a server without independent oversight that only Doge officials could access.
This verdict sends a clear message about the protection of digital health data and the responsibilities of Big Tech. Companies like Meta that covertly profit from users' most intimate information must be held accountable.
Meta argues that generative AI models need large and diverse datasets which can only be achieved through real human discussions found in Facebook and Instagram posts.
