Privacy Today

I decided to explore the terms and conditions of my Pandora app on my iPhone. Pandora says that they reserve the right to update and amend the user agreement. They will post the amended terms and conditions on their website. However, it says nothing about them being required to inform, email, or notify the user in any way that the terms have been updated. The terms also free Pandora from any liability if anything happens to your information through them. By agree to the terms and conditions, you basically tell Pandora if your information gets out, they cannot be sued. It also says that you must be 13 or older to use the app, which isn’t something that pops up blatantly when you download the application. And we all know that a 13 year old isn’t likely to read the terms and conditions.

The app doesn’t seem to access other information, so it appears to be a pretty clean app. The inner workings of the app are all app-related, so the app gains knowledge about my musical preferences by how I respond to the songs they play for me. I was actually a little surprised, after reading about terms on Tinder accessing your other dating apps, that Pandora doesn’t access your other music apps, such as Spotify, iTunes, etc.). The app collects my musical tastes, so perhaps if I had Spotify had a term where they could access Pandora, they would use it to target me for certain new artists/music. However, this app appears pretty clean in comparison to, say, the Facebook messenger app.

I don’t know how I’d answer the ethical question. I think by giving us terms and conditions, the apps are really doing they’re job. Unfortunately, it’s not the app developer’s fault that people don’t read the terms and conditions. My iPhone doesn’t do it (I don’t think), but I know my husband’s Samsung phone pops up with a list of the things the apps he wants to download are allowed to access. I think this certainly helps people get a gist of the terms, but doesn’t protect them from not reading what is literally put right in front of them. This is not hacking, as the user is accepting these conditions.

If I were a famous hacker, such as Edward Snowden, I probably wouldn’t have the guts to tell, but I do think he did the right thing. I think the government probably kept that a secret because they wouldn’t want to out themselves to the people who they were tracking who were actually doing sketchy things. He may have tainted a way that the government had to spy on people, but he did expose such a huge privacy invasion that was important to know as an individual. I personally do not think it is worth it to lower your quality of life, so I would not have done it, but perhaps if I were put in his position, I may have. I really can’t say, as I am not in his position. I think the Panama Papers bring up a lot of really good questions, but I’m not sure if it is super ethical. Just because you expose someone doesn’t make it right. If you look hard enough, you can find dirt on anyone, and I think fishing into information like that is a little unethical. However, again, things are being exposed, so will anything come of this? I’m not sure. Is it worth it? I suppose that will be yet to be determined. Also, if this hacker has a particular affiliation to a country or party, they could skew the data they share to make someone they prefer look favorable. I think the person who hacked into the data should be put on trial, but I also think the exposed information is good information, so perhaps those people should be put on trial, as well.