An interesting article in the Financial Times, “Forget privacy, young internet users want to be tracked”, looks at how young people seem to be more than happy sharing their location with their family or friends, both for safety and convenience.
This is not the first article I have read about this aspect of Generation Z behavior, and of course it reminded me of the days when my daughter started going on school trips — before smartphones and geolocation apps — and would take a small GPS device in her backpack, which gave us peace of mind. Even during her teenage years, she never had any problem with us knowing her geolocation, and now, in her thirties and with her own family, she continues to share it with us via both Google Maps and her iPhone.
I also share my geolocation, not just with close family members, but with one of my oldest friends, something we started doing when he was living in an earthquake risk zone. At the same time, I avoid sharing my geolocation with most of my apps, except for those it makes sense to do so with; I strongly oppose the sale of data, which is unethical and takes place on an industrial scale. I totally support the decision by Apple to warn users about geolocation tracking in apps installed on their smartphones, a move that upset the filthy data broker market. Similarly, the company set an important precedent by offering satellite geolocation for emergencies when the user was in an off-grid area without coverage.
As said, while I am opposed to the commercial use of my geolocation data, I have no problem when it comes to sharing it with family or friends, which is why I find it interesting that so many younger people also do so, at least when their parents finally allow them to have a smartphone. Going further, I would argue that it is a good incentive for children to have a smartphone earlier, since, as I have already said on numerous occasions, I would rather have young people with smartphones who know how to use them to their full potential and who understand their dangers, to uninformed teenagers who get one when it is too late to educate them.
Geolocation is a powerful tool that must be managed with common sense. But with the right education and attitudes, I think it is not only useful, but convenient, and a test of trust. Do some people misuse it? Of course, like any tool: the development of appropriate and reasonable protocols for use usually occurs long after a new technology is widely available. But if young people have no problem with sharing their geolocation, developing their own rules of etiquette, uses and customs, and that does not reflect, as everything seems to indicate, a systematic disregard for privacy, then I can only welcome this trend.
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This post was previously published on Enrique Dans’ blog.
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From The Good Men Project on Medium
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