Just How Many Consumers Care About Privacy Issues?

Filed in archive Privacy and Security on September 9, 2004

Rajat Paharia over at Rootburn has created a fascinating Powerpoint presentation to understand why some RFID applications cause a consumer uproar and others don't. Check it out here.

The analysis and conceptualization is excellent. His Powerpoint is very nicely done, also.

I think Rajat's thinking is apt. But I also think it applies only to those consumers who can muster up enough interest to care about the privacy issues in the first place.

Other than a "handful" of vocal privacy advocates, and a larger but still relatively small percentage of consumers who stop to think about the privacy implications, the vast majority of the public simply won't care. They won't care because most of them just won't think about the issues.

I'll give you an example. Consider credit cards and modern-day banking. The credit card companies and the banks have huge volumes of data about their customers. As Tim Oren wrote a while back, instead of fixating on RFID, we should be more concerned about all those databases out there with information about us.

Yet, the average consumer doesn't care about any of this. It's a variation of the old maxim "I think therefore I am." Consumers don't think about the privacy concerns, ergo the privacy issues don't exist for them.

Why the lack of interest? My theory is that we all are confronted with too many issues in our modern-day, over-stimulated existences. The average consumer can only think about so much, without overloading the mental circuits.

However, just because only a small percentage of consumers care about privacy doesn't mean companies can ignore them. Those who care may wield enough power to influence lawmakers.