There was some buzz today about the LinkedIn policy to automatically enroll people in volunteering their data for Generative AI Improvement. I will share the link at the bottom of this article so you can turn it off if you want to. My reaction was horror. The evil corporation will reach their prying eyes into everything I do and use it against me! Oh no! However, then some reactions started to come in. Many people were shrugging this off as no big deal. Some people were laughing because there was no hiding what you did on the platform anyway. They were making some good points on that front. However, I still found myself concerned. Do I want personal data to be potentially rifled through by a crawling bot hungrily thirsting for more parameters to train with?
Staying Private is Not Easy
Pondering this thought, I started thinking about how I would go about protecting my privacy even if I wanted to. It feels like, with all this new automation, the idea of protecting your privacy is almost laughable. Do not get me wrong; I think it is important to protect your privacy and not do careless and stupid things that can expose you to fraud, theft, or worse. Some things are now considered common sense when living in this digital ecosystem. For example, using the same password for every online site, including your bank account, is probably not the best idea. Which, unfortunately, most people do. So, the banks have had to resort to mandatory 2FA to meet regulatory requirements. People are so careless with passwords that implementing a way to thwart potential threats is to require alternative verification. I am on the board of a privacy company and they produce a great tool to remove our exposure to agencies that might sell details about us that they collect. This is a great tool, but it only scratches the surface on the number, types, and methodologies to steal our privacy.
The Futility of Going Off Grid
A few years ago, when I was young and had the energy, I decided to try to remove myself from “the grid.” You know, unplug from the matrix. That clearly did not work out very well, seeing as I was recording my words and putting them out on social channels. I started using VPNs, locked my home down with aggressive firewall technology, and locked down all my personal computing devices. I created a new bank account that only had a small amount transferred every few weeks. This is the account I use to spend money in public places. I created email addresses and Google phone numbers for each vendor I was forced to sign up for. I even assigned apartment numbers to my home address so that when a marketer would send mail to suite #101, I would know who sold my details. I removed myself from all lists, created fake personas for all memberships and “rewards” programs, and fought with vendors of EULAs that were too aggressive. I did all of that effort, only to find out that things got worse.
Security Through Obscurity
I have always been a technology hack, so I was confident I could pull this off so that I could out game the system. I was wrong; in fact, through my attempt at obscurity, I became a target. The more I tried to hide myself, the more I stuck out as an anomaly and, therefore, became an easier target. I had more fraud attempts and identification threats during that time than any other because there simply seemed to be some security by being with the herd. Security through obscurity is what they would call this. This led me to the concept that if I pretend that I have nothing to hide, then there will be no incentive to get access to what I have. Additionally, the more you blend in with the behavior patterns of everyone else, the more your data is viewed in the aggregate and not in anything specific. We always inspect what is different and glaze over what is the same.
Don’t Look Here
So I buy my toilet paper and bottled water at CostCo, get my personal care products and pharmaceuticals at CVS, and everything else on Amazon. We get most of our groceries with Instacart and all the good stuff at Trader Joes. I consume my content on Netflix along with a few other services, and I doomscroll on the same social channels. I allow the algorithm to feed me content based on my personal interests and get my news from the expected sources. I am a good little consumer, and I obey my masters well. There is nothing to see here, nothing to worry about. Now, move your all-seeing eye right over this little spot and find someone else to focus on. So far, so good; now, if I could only get the IRS to overlook me. So far, I have not figured that out. That algorithm appears to be pretty simple. Crush everyone, no stone unturned. Everyone pays, and if you have a little bit of money saved up, you get to pay more.
Herd Privacy
So, besides my miserable and constant tax problem, I sit in happy bliss in my obscurity. So, I wonder if there is some truth to this concept that you are better protected by compliance and acceptance. That has never been my instinct; I am a freedom-loving privacy-first advocate, but in all honesty, I may have to consider the possibility that the only way to achieve this outcome is by flying beneath the radar and not way out in front. I am saying this with a slight tone of sarcasm, but now that I think this, though, this is a natural phenomenon. What I am calling herd privacy or herd anonymity is the idea of being camouflaged. This is something that happens in nature all the time. It seems the insects in my backyard know more about blending into their environment and protecting their privacy than I do.
Becoming Part of the Digital Herd
The idea of herd privacy has been on my mind lately. I’ve always been someone who values personal freedom and the right to privacy, but lately, I’m starting to wonder if maybe I’ve been thinking about it all wrong. When you spend your life pushing back against the systems and trying to stay out of sight, you might actually end up drawing more attention to yourself. It’s like trying to be the person in a crowd who’s wearing bright neon in the hopes that no one will notice you. Turns out, the more you try to hide, the more obvious you become.
There’s a strange comfort in just blending in—going along with the flow and allowing yourself to be part of the digital herd. The algorithms might still track my every move, but maybe they won’t care so much if I’m just another face in the crowd, another average user with nothing too special going on. It’s a shift in mindset, for sure. For years, I believed that total privacy was the goal, and that if I could somehow slip under the radar, I’d be safe. But maybe I’ve had it all wrong. Maybe the key is not to fight it but to embrace it, to move with the current instead of against it.
Now, don’t get me wrong—I’m still not about to throw all caution to the wind. I’m not saying we should ignore the risks of data exposure or forget basic security measures. But in this world where everything we do is tracked, and every action is part of a larger digital footprint, maybe the secret isn’t in standing out but in fading in. By blending into the noise of everyday life, maybe we can achieve a kind of privacy after all. It’s a strange thought, but perhaps the most effective way to disappear is simply to be just like everyone else.
Here is the link to the LinkedIn setting to “Opt-Out” of participating in the Generative AI Improvement program. Thanks to Cassie Kozyrkov for her post alerting me to this. Are you ready to stand out from the herd? Take the Red Pill?
