Online privacy has become a selling point for companies

It wasn’t that long ago that the issue of online privacy wasn’t one that was talked about very often, at least not as often as other issues. People just didn’t really care, or just didn’t seem to care. In the post-Snowden world, however, online privacy has become one of the most talked about issues out there and has essentially become a selling point for many companies which is very, very good. 

Late last year, Apple’s public relations gurus released “a message from Tim Cook about Apple’s commitment to your privacy.” The post explained Apple’s policies and its inner workings. But it was also a sales pitch:”Our business model is very straightforward: We sell great products. We don’t build a profile based on your email content or web browsing habits to sell to advertisers. We don’t “monetize” the information you store on your iPhone or in iCloud. And we don’t read your email or your messages to get information to market to you.” For years, conventional wisdom has had it that people just don’t care about privacy online. Mark Zuckerberg famously declared back in 2010 that privacy was no longer a social norm. Similar sentiments continue to find their way into the headlines, including at this publication. But various pieces of research have shown the very opposite.