Final Post - Technology has been an Instrumental part of my Life

 

        Since I was in kindergarten I had my own personal laptop device. I was introduced to the internet early and portable technology has been an instrumental role in my life. I got my first cell phone, which was a semi smartphone, in the fifth grade and my first iPhone a year later in the sixth grade. Since getting an iPhone it has made my life a lot more seamless and literally has put access to the outside world in the palm of my hands. The president of United States has a lot of communication, security, safety, and health equipment and tools at the White House to ensure that he can govern properly. When he is on his aircraft Air Force One or his automobile The Beast he has everything that he has in White House along side with him on the go. They are essentially mini duplicates of the White House. I consider my iPhone to be my mobile "White House" whenever I am away from home for several reasons. I houses my phone (which ironically is what I use it for the least) my calendar, all of my social networking and communication tools, it is my wallet, my bank, holds my notes, it's how I clock in for work, my personal camera, sometimes my TV, among so many other things. Simply put without it I would have no efficiency in my life. It also is able to seamlessly connect with my other Apple devices for continuity meaning that if I start something on one device I can finish it on the other without even having to tell it to do so. Having these devices and social media comes with a lot of risk though, most of all breach of my privacy. People in my generation don't seem to care too much for their privacy because they use the "I have nothing to hide argument." I even fall into this argument sometimes, but then I realize that may harm me in the long run.

When it comes to my actual hardware and software I am not concerned too much about privacy because Apple has a very good reputation for ensuring their users privacy on their devices and makes it known. They also let users control on their devices how much privacy and tracking they will allow them and 3rd party apps access to. When it comes to social media and other 3rd party apps, privacy is almost considered a far-cry to them. When I first started using these apps in middle school I didn't really have a care in the world for privacy, I was just happy that my parents finally let me use these sites. Especially since my account was "private" I thought that I was shielded from the world in terms of what I posted and only my approved followers could see what I posted. I never posted anything to obscene or inappropriate that would bar me from getting a job in the future, and after googling myself my digital footprint seem to verify that on the surface. As I got older though I became super cautious about what I posted on all of my social media accounts, and even purged them right before I came to college and remodeled them so that they would be more professional. But what scares me the most is how tech and social media companies can track your every move and know your preferences off the back of their hands. This feature has become more uncontrollable and scarier by the day. For example, I had a friend who was about to leave his house one day and he mentioned, out loud, that he wanted some McDonalds, and when he got in the car Siri suggested to him on his phone the closest McDonalds location. It's not the fact that our phones are listening to us for the purposes of marketing, but what it's the question of what will the companies that they sell our info to do with that information in the future and will the government get ahold of it. 

So the overarching question is even if tech. companies sell your information solely for marketing purposes, do they have a bigger plan for how they're going to use that data in the future or even if how the government might use it, if they have it. Is this the end to privacy as we know it? Even so I am not concerned for the time being even though I should probably be considering how much personal information I have fed into the internet and given to tech. companies. And you never know, the government works in mysterious ways!