Conflict in Tech: Internet company revenue models versus privacy expectations of regular people using the Internet

This column highlights the conflict between current business models for large internet companies versus the expectations and wants of regular people interacting with those companies on a daily basis. Recently, Apple changed privacy practices in its App Store and Safari browser. Changes allow users to choose more privacy and less tracking than was previously available. A prominent revenue stream for large technology companies relies on tracking and gathering personal information about people, then selling that information to advertisers. Specifically, this may be the primary source of revenue for both Google and Facebook. Meanwhile, Apple's changes both threaten the business model that technology has fallen into and also provide a window into the desires of regular people. Since allowing users the choice to give or deny permission for newly installed App Store apps to communicate with other apps and track user activity outside of the app on the device, about 94% of installs have chosen to deny this permission. This shows how much conflict there is between wants for people using the internet and business models of major internet companies.