Privacy and sustainability – fundamental human rights

Multiple times a day, every single day, we share our personal data. It is being collected and sold, and for a long time, it has been a gold mine for many companies – small ones and giant enterprises like Google and Facebook alike. There is no doubt about the huge financial value personal data possesses. Companies who have built their business based on personal data, would most likely look completely different had they not had access to all the information about us.

As third-party data is on its way out, some believe that the risk involved is a bad user experience. We believe the contrary. There were good reasons to implement a law to protect us from having our personal data used as a commodity. We might think that we are not really affected by it, but all of this has a downside – and it’s far from protecting the individual.

So, is it true that personal data gives a better user experience? Yes, in a way – if you’re not too worried about being monitored and having your habits and personal data distributed to third parties to give you that experience. However, we firmly believe that with contextual marketing, privacy and user experience can co-exist.

User experience vs privacy

At some point, surely you have felt quite startled by how ads sometimes seem to hit the mark, as if “somebody” was reading your mind. No matter where you spend your time online, there is always somebody tracing you. It does sound a bit creepy when you think about it, but that is what’s happening today. Enterprises like Google and Facebook collect data continuously to create profiles about all of us – your interests, your political standpoint, your sexual orientation, your culture, and many other things. The ads you see in your feed are governed by sophisticated algorithms based on that personal data.

The enforcement of GDPR

Personal data, despite it being covered by GDPR regulations, has been so lucrative that many companies are willing to stretch the boundaries for what’s legal and not. Most of the biggest enterprises do not seem to be scared off by the sky-high fines. As long as the profits are greater than the loss for the business, they seem to weigh in the risk of getting fined. Companies who operate in the legal grey area, or violate the law, are also the ones who profit most from it, according to the Norwegian Data Protection Agency.

One of the biggest challenges in our industry is the fact that businesses outside of the EU seem to take the European GDPR law quite lightly. Big enterprises with massive pools of personal data are almost absolute rulers and force the rest of the industry to adapt to their model. In our opinion, the result is a model that totally lacks support for a sustainable way of doing business.

The EU is now reviewing how to make this clearer and easier for the consumer to decide whether to allow personal data collection or not when browsing the web.

GDPR aims to protect

GDPR is not a regulation that serves to make it harder for companies to do business. Instead, it was enforced as a result of grave human rights violations. For that reason, we need laws and regulations to give each and every one of us what we want and need: protection and privacy.

Privacy and sustainability – our common responsibilities

We believe that we all must protect our integrity; not just our own, but also other people’s. At Kobler, we are very committed in protecting people’s privacy. That is why we enable marketers to advertise in the right way without tracing potential customers and without it having a negative impact on the bottom line. We own that responsibility and do what we can to protect the privacy of people. That gives us a great chance to do sustainable business!

Curious to learn more about privacy and sustainability? Or would you like to be inspired and get practical advice on how to communicate sustainability in your business? Make sure you don’t miss this year’s sustainability conference in Oslo – Green Camp!

When: April 28th
Where: Klingenberg cinema in Oslo, Norway

Check out the program and the lecturers, and register!

Would you like to know more about contextual advertising?

Get in touch with us!