Data is becoming increasingly important. Those who do not have, collect, analyze or buy data will drop out. Data is the reason that companies like Google and Facebook have grown into online giants within ten years that are indispensable. But how far do you go as a company? Which customer data do you use and which do you not? And how far do you ultimately want to go? Where is the limit?
Almost simultaneously with the rise of websites such as Google and Facebook, the question arose to what extent these types of sites can be trusted. It was often not clear enough what these agencies did with the privacy of the user. And especially in recent years, privacy concerns have gotten out of hand now that these companies, together with Microsoft, Apple and Amazon, among others, are list to data involved in a continuous battle for the best services, the most users and the most valuable data.
Google was performing a kind of 'long con' here, where the company gradually, with each new service it set up, gathered together pieces of the puzzle that is the user, in order to arrive at a pool of data that it can now use to further optimize the services and thus be able to charge more for advertisements. Facebook, on the other hand, was less beating around the bush and proved with almost every new feature that they were busy collecting useful and valuable user data.
Meanwhile, the consumer did not sit still. Increasingly, first in the underground media but later also in the regular online and offline media, reports appeared that companies such as Google and Facebook had (quietly) implemented changes or released updates that were in conflict with the prevailing unwritten rules or the legal restrictions that commercial companies are bound by.