At yesterday's packed Digiday: Target conference at the W Hotel in NYC, the closing panelists debated data ownership arguing for or against advertisers, ad agencies, adnetworks and vendors as owners.  Audience members, however, wondered if consumers would agree with the panelists, suggesting instead that consumers wanted control over their own data.

Live Twittering during Digiday: Target conference, June 8, 2009

Past is Prologue

If the past is prologue, consumers will continue to demand control over their data but not follow through.  Facebook earlier this year grappled with this very question -- and found that consumers say they want control but their behavior suggests otherwise.  For those who missed the hub-bub:  Facebook quietly changed their Terms of Service in February only to have cyber-citizens spring into action, decrying it's authoritarian takeover of their personal information.  Some 750 blogs, countless status updates and tweets and a fan page People Against the New Terms, with 148,000 fans at its height -- not to mention all the media attention -- prompted EPIC, an electronic privacy organization, in collaboration with 25 other consumer groups, to file a lawsuit with the FTC, accusing Facebook of privacy violations.

Chastened, Facebook backed down and instead invited its users to help contribute and ratify a new Terms of Service as well as their Privacy Principles.  Despite the furor, less than 3,000 Facebook users (.0015% of all FB users) contributed comments to the Terms of Service or the Privacy Principles and only 640,000 of 200 million Facebook users voted, or about 32% turned out. Of those that voted, three-fourths supported the new Terms of Service and Privacy Principles.  And, in the ultimate test, very few left Facebook, according to Compete.

Market Research Confirms

The Facebook experience though, is not unique.  Market research has consistently found that consumers say one thing but do another.  A survey conducted by Peter D. Hart & Associates on behalf of the Consumer Privacy Awareness Project earlier this year revealed:

• Consumers think they are knowledgeable about online privacy, but many are unaware of how their activity and behaviors can be followed and collected online.
  • 70% of Internet users say they are very or fairly knowledgeable about how to protect their personal privacy online
  • 42% are unsure whether their online activity is tracked and recorded by companies for commercial purposes
  • 12% believe that tracking by companies for commercial purposes does not happen at all

• Consumers do not always read privacy policies.
  • 32% say they have read their ISP privacy policy closely
  • 30% have read online retailers’ privacy policies closely
  • 18% have read search engine privacy policies closely

Relatedly, Consumer Reports found universal concern among Americans (92%) about online privacy but only a quarter taking actions to delete cookies or using other tools to hide their identities.

We Live in Public Now

To large extent this dichotomy of stated vs actual behavior is driven or exacerbated by the fact that we live in public now -- on Facebook, Twitter, Flickr, YouTube and so many more places.  To live publicly means giving up some of your privacy --something politicians, celebrities and corporations have long understood (and, also complained about).  It's the digital equivalent of Rousseau's social contract.  Digital providers, advertisers, agencies and adnetworks have a responsibility to draft and disclose fair and clear privacy and data policies and practices as well as provide options for opting out.  For consumers, who want to use these digital services, it means giving up some privacy and/or being more judicious about what they post and do online -- just as they do today in the non-digital world for retailer or airline loyalty programs.