“Multiliteracies for Inclusive Technologies: A Case Study on Location-Based Services and Domestic Violence Survivors”

by Jennifer Roth Miller | Xchanges 12.1

Location-Based Services & Privacy, Cont.

A few online conglomerates — social media and search giants such as Facebook, Twitter, and Google — collect and control most of this information (Barreneche, 2012). Wilken (2014) asserts social media users should shift their understanding of sites like Facebook from viewing them as social sites to understanding them as mobile location platforms amassing geodemographic information. The evolved model of these sites is to become mobile advertising conglomerates and they need to collect users’ mobile activity patterns to remain competitive to advertisers.

With each privacy agreement and each application, people allow more traces of personal information to be captured (Greenberg, 2013). User agreements tend to be very lengthy, difficult to understand, constantly changing, and composed of legal jargon. The demand for immediate information usually results in a quick non-critical acceptance of new agreements and clauses. Critical literacy on the part of users is warranted because smartphones automatically geotag many of our communications through default settings, and over time more applications access our location information to the point it becomes normalized (Barreneche, 2012).

Evans (2014) discusses geolocation information as a map that can be created top-down, bottom-up, or a combination of both. He performed a discourse analysis on code from Foursquare check-ins to show how location information and other metadata are embedded in code. Location metadata combined with other data accessible on the network creates a social and historical story of places and activity. Beyond leaving data that can be aggregated into marketing profiles, tech-savvy criminals can extract personal information from code, presenting consequences that traverse digital spaces to result in real offline impact.

Gane and Beer (2008) assert that interfaces are points of politics, power, and control. Successful interfaces allow a smooth integration from the human to non-human. The transfer of information is so seamless that many don’t understand or even know what is happening to the full extent. These interfaces were built with specific values and beliefs about privacy — they rhetorically convince people that sharing personal information is normal and valued.

To gauge users’ actual views on geolocation, this research project employed a casual poll of social media users. Respondents were concerned about robbery, stalking, danger for kids, teens, and women, and government monitoring. Men who responded were not very concerned. Younger Millennial respondents were less concerned overall than older generation respondents. The perceived danger appeared to be low in the mainstream population. However, the concerns for women’s safety pointed to a non-mainstream population that experienced a significant tangible threat to safety: domestic violence survivors.