Nowadays, messaging apps are highly appreciated by users worldwide, but they are also constantly targeted by privacy protection groups and governments. Such a case was the infamous WhatsApp one in Germany case, which was only a prelude for what has yet to come in other European nations. In fact, in the first few weeks of, 2017 the European Commission proposed a new legislation, forcing messaging apps like WhatsApp, Google Hangouts and Facebook to assure stronger data privacy for their customers. According to the measures worded in the new legislation, the consent of the client will be the main deciding factor. In other words, European internet users will be in charge of deciding what information may be collected by the sites.
Věra Jourová, Commissioner for Justice, Consumers and Gender Equality, stated that this new strategy will hopefully make international data exchanges in the global digital economy easier, while also promoting high data protection standards worldwide.
With this new proposal, Facebook, WhatsApp, Google and many others have to guarantee the confidentiality of their customers’ conversations by asking for your permission before tracking you online and showing you so-called targeted advertisements. This measure is especially important in disarming Google, which is known for being particularly sensitive in what privacy issues is concerned due to admitting to looking into customers’ emails and bombarding them with targeted ads without their prior consent.
Furthermore, if the new legislation is accepted and ratified by the European Parliament, cookies and other metadata will also be submitted to the prior consent of each individual user. Cookiesare (delicious) trails for tech companies you leave behind when visiting a determined site and thus are one of the main sources for targeted advertisement. Metadata, on the other hand, act as some sort of online border controllers, collecting information about the time you visited a determined website, the place of access, the device you used and the timely length of your visit. In fact, this data is used by companies to upgrade their services and further develop their sites, based on what section is most visited, where people spend most of their time, etc. However, under the new law, both cookies and metadata, if linked to a messaging app, have to be deleted effective immediately if you choose not to allow the further use of them. If the affected companies fail to comply by these new regulations, they will face major fines.
Although the proposal is still waiting to be accepted and ratified by the EP and EU Member States, the Commission expects the legislation to enter into effect by the end of May 2018. The hurry is completely justifiable here, because over 90% of Europeans want their data to be protected even more or, especially, want to be asked for prior consent before data collection happens.
However, there is an unwanted “victim” of the new legislation: ad blockers, which can be legally prohibited from now on in order to ensure the funding of free content via advertisement revenue. In fact, some websites like the German news site Bild.de or WIRED.com already take this prohibition seriously, as they only give you full access to their content if you include them in your ad blocker’s whitelist. Alternatively, WIRED also offers you the choice of paying $1 per week for an ad-free version of its website.
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