spied on and hackable

Browsing in any of the most popular social networks, has it happened to you that advertisements, news, and even publications from other contacts begin to appear, with topics and things that you were thinking or working on, in that period of time? Suddenly, “out of the blue”, they find themselves besieged by a huge amount of information that, apparently, they had not requested. As if, by magic, someone had guessed their wishes and thoughts.

What seems like an enchantment, and which increasingly surprises us, has a prosaic answer: artificial intelligence —present in the social network algorithm— shows us what we want to see. The machine, in there, “guess” our wishes. Our tastes and preferences are shown as a mirror, somewhat distorted, in the content that we consume digitally.

The history of our searches, visits or purchases is sufficient material so that, through this digital footprint, a profile of us and what interests us or could interest us is built. A harmless click on a site, an involuntary or careless puncture, is enough so that in our next navigations we are tempted to sting with similar or complementary notes, products or services. We are being “spyed on” 24 hours a day and we feed huge databases that prepare offers tailored to our predilections, conscious or unconscious.

Subscription streaming service platforms —to watch series and movies— are less invasive or surprising in their offer: when you finish watching the season of a series or a film, they already have a menu prepared for us: “Because you enjoyed …”, and right there they recommend similar audiovisuals or of the same genre. This makes us predictable and repetitive spectators and we move within what, supposedly, we have chosen. But, in reality, within the infinite offer that we have, we do not see what we want, but rather what the algorithm deduces that we want and wants to please us. We stay in a familiar and predictable space and we choose to “choose” what is put on our plate.

In an essay, Yuval Noah Harari, pointed out that “free will does not exist” and that “we are hackable animals, prone to being manipulated.” And this is well known to those who do political marketing and who have an army of digital warriors (cyberllunkus, winged monkeys) trying to manage public opinion with propaganda, lies, half-truths and an open manipulation of information that floods the vast digital world. and tries to influence our way of voting or living.

The excess of offers overwhelms us and causes anxiety, due to which we appreciate the filter provided by the algorithms that facilitate the selection and decision of content to consume. However, those recommendations keep us within certain personal preference parameters and prevent us from exploring and discovering perspectives other than a caricature of ourselves. We will have to dare to ignore the digital flute of Hamelin and break ranks to go against the current.