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Privacy as the right to control your information

If you view privacy as the right to control your own information, then, from a legal perspective at least, we aren’t crossing any lines. The photographers whose images we took each chose to make their work freely available on Flickr, under a license that allows for commercial reuse.

But not everyone realized exactly what that meant — and that caused trouble when Flickr announced a new printing service, in which these commercially licensed photos could be bought as wall prints from Flickr, with none of the proceeds going to the photographers themselves. According to the copyright license and the Terms of Service, Flickr didn’t have to share the revenues. But it angered users, and the company pulled back after a few weeks following an uproar by the photographers (it still sells images from licensed artists, and splits the revenue with them).

Because we’re using photos of children, the bar is a bit higher; in some jurisdictions we have to ask permission of the parents or guardians, for example. But you could also argue, which we have done, that by uploading a photo of their own child, the parents or guardians have implicitly given their consent. It’s a gray area, we know.

That doesn’t stop other websites from also using these photos. After tracing some of these photographs on Google Image Search, we found the same pictures reappearing on various websites, including ones related to mental health, child protection, and even travel.

This only scratches the surface. Big Web conglomerates earn billions with everyone’s private information. The Web runs on user-generated content — text, videos, music, art, etc. — made and shared by ordinary people. The moment you post something on Facebook or YouTube, you enter into a contract with that company, and from then on they’re free to benefit from your material in any way they see fit, mainly by selling ads around it, but in some cases by selling your data, or using your avatar and other personal information for commercial purposes.

Let’s consider Facebook. In late January the site’s Terms of Service were renewed. Now you automatically agree to give Facebook permission to:

• Store, use, and reuse all photos, text, and images you post on the platform.

• Analyze all your financial transactions on Facebook, for example while playing Candy Crush Saga.

• Keep track of your activities on all sites outside Facebook that have a Like or Share button installed.

Facebook has a very legitimate need for storing, using, and reusing your data — it’s what allows the site to show you your friends’ photos and activity, after all — but the wording is also fuzzy enough that there is basically no limitation on what it can do with your data, such as reusing your photos commercially.

Or take Google. Every time you search for an app, game, book, or movie using Google Play, you get to see recommendations from people who are in your Google+ circle. They have also given permission for their name and avatar images to be used for advertising purposes.

In other words: By agreeing with the often impenetrable legalese that makes up the general conditions and privacy terms, we are, more often than not, giving up our right to control our content.