Are consumers aware of policies that protect online privacy?

The Extended Mind conducted a 1,010 person survey of U.S. participants weighted to the 2019 American Community Survey using age, gender, race, household income and census region. The goal was to assess consumer knowledge about current data practices and protections, as well as to gather consumer preferences around data management for VR and AR (XR) data. This research was funded by Meta Reality Labs.

In recent years, laws have been passed to offer people more protection of their personal data. For example, the California Consumer Protection Act (CCPA) offers Californians more control over their data and how it is used while facial recognition bans, which have been implemented in certain cities and states within the US, have offered some level of protection against widespread biometric data collection and scanning.

Given that these are the types of legal protections that are offered to people around their data, we were curious to see how aware our survey respondents were of the protections that applied to them. This would be particularly important for consumer empowerment laws which require consumer participation to be effective.

California Consumer Protection Act Awareness

The CCPA offers Californians greater access to and control over their data through “the right to know about the personal information a business collects about them and how it is used and shared; the right to delete personal information collected from them (with some exceptions); the right to opt-out of the sale of their personal information; and the right to non-discrimination for exercising their CCPA rights” (CCPA, 2021).

In order to assess consumer awareness of the CCPA, we asked survey respondents if any of the above protections applied to them. We found that:

• 68% (n=122) accurately claimed one or more protections

• 32% (n=58) inaccurately claimed they had no protections

Overall, Californians underestimated their protections. Almost a third claimed they had zero of the CCPA’s protections while many others only claimed one or two of protections offered to them, which would indicate that Californians are not well versed in the laws protecting their only privacy.

We decided to offer the questions of CCPA protections to all survey respondents, including those in other states. Interestingly, they claimed CCPA protections at similar rates to Californians.

• 60% (n=498) inaccurately claimed one or more of the CCPA protections for themselves

• 40% (n=332) accurately claimed they had no protections

One possible explanation for the similar response rates between Californians and non-Californians is that survey respondents responded to this question based on the protections they felt they should have rather than their actual knowledge of the laws in place.

Facial Recognition Ban Awareness

Facial recognition bans are bans on the use of facial recognition technology within certain cities or states. The majority of these bans apply to governmental or police use, but some apply to corporate use as well. For a deeper look at some of the bans being put into place, you can use this map from www.banfacialrecognition.com

We asked our survey respondents if they lived in areas with a facial recognition ban and cross-referenced their locations with their responses in order to gauge their knowledge. Overall, we found that people who live in areas with bans are largely unaware of the bans. And, similarly to the case of the CCPA, those in areas with and without bans claimed the protections at similar rates.

Takeaways

Awareness levels of existing privacy protections are relatively low based on this survey. More research is needed to better understand these results. Is it possible that people actually knew more about these protections, but somehow didn’t believe the policies applied to them?

The similarity in response rates between Californians and non-Californians (as well as those within and without of facial recognition ban areas) also calls into question whether respondents were basing their responses off actual knowledge or if their responses were motivated by something else such as feelings or expectations. More research is needed to fully understand how people learn about and interact with consumer privacy protections.

To see the full survey results, visit: www.extendedmind.io/survey

Resources

California Consumer Privacy Act (CCPA). (2021, July 14). State of California — Department of Justice — Office of the Attorney General. https://oag.ca.gov/privacy/ccpa