{"id":111633,"date":"2021-06-11T11:15:42","date_gmt":"2021-06-11T05:45:42","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/blog.forumias.com\/?p=111633"},"modified":"2021-06-11T11:19:00","modified_gmt":"2021-06-11T05:49:00","slug":"privacy-and-data-rights-in-the-age-of-social-audio","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/forumias.com\/blog\/privacy-and-data-rights-in-the-age-of-social-audio\/","title":{"rendered":"Securing privacy and data rights in the age of social audio"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<p><b>Synopsis: <\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Privacy and data rights remain out of focus on social audio.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<p><b>Introduction<br \/>\n<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">The clubhouse is a new social networking app based around audio rooms. It crossed over 2 million Android downloads last month. The main feature of the app is the unique audio medium through which its users interact.<\/span><\/p>\n<ul>\n<li style=\"font-weight: 400;\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">This feature makes clubhouse different from other platforms like Facebook, Instagram, TikTok, WhatsApp, and YouTube. These apps use text, images, video, or a combination of three.<\/span><\/li>\n<li style=\"font-weight: 400;\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">The app does not have separate texting features or the option to create online profiles. Its focus is purely on audio-based interaction.<\/span><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p><b>What are the issues with such apps?<\/b><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">The nature of the app raises questions on privacy and data rights. <strong>Audio rooms bring new challenges for data regulators<\/strong>. As they have not yet found ways to control traditional social media platforms.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><strong>\u00a0Read Also :-<a href=\"https:\/\/forumias.com\/blog\/upsc-interview-etiquette-basics\/\">UPSC INTERVIEW ETIQUETTE: BASICS<\/a><\/strong><\/p>\n<ul>\n<li style=\"list-style-type: none;\">\n<ul>\n<li><b>Firstly, audio-based exchanges are faster and in real-time.<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> Thus, traditional methods of <span style=\"text-decoration: underline;\">content moderation may not<\/span> work here. <\/span><b><a href=\"https:\/\/forumias.com\/blog\/mha-releases-booklet-on-cyberbullying\/\">Cyber-bullying<\/a> and trolling, driven by sexism, racism and communalism, can be more damaging on apps like a clubhouse<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">.<\/span><\/li>\n<li><b>Secondly, <\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">anyone can join any room that their friends are a part of, <\/span><b>this makes stalking easier. The app even sends notifications to its followers.<\/b><\/li>\n<li><b>Thirdly,<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> the experience on Clubhouse includes a constant awareness about how every action is being shown to followers. This awareness <\/span><b>and the fear of being judged will limit people from exploring the app\u2019s content.<\/b>\n<ul>\n<li><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">This is opposite to Instagram, Facebook, Twitter which allow browsing in invisibility.<\/span><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<\/li>\n<li><b>Fourthly, Clubhouse temporarily records the audio in a room<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> while the room is live, this is a major concern. It says that it deletes the recording when the room ends. <\/span><b>The app lacks end-to-end encryption, which makes the data still potentially accessible. This<\/b> <b>recording is done without the consent of the user.<\/b>\n<ul>\n<li><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Privacy expert Alexander Hanff says the platform\u2019s practices are <strong>violating<\/strong> many provisions of <span style=\"text-decoration: underline;\">Europe\u2019s General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR)<\/span>.\u00a0<\/span><\/li>\n<li><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">A report by the Stanford Internet Observatory stated that the backend infrastructure of Clubhouse is given by a Chinese start-up called Agora. The report mentions a risk of the Chinese government accessing raw audio and other security flaws.<\/span><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<\/li>\n<li><b>Fifthly, India does not have a strict data protection law: <\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">This makes its users more vulnerable to data breaches and privacy violations. The lack of end-to-end encryption in Clubhouse could also make it an easy tool for government surveillance.<\/span><\/li>\n<li><b>Lastly, Clubhouse takes permission to access users\u2019 contacts<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">, which is a significant privacy concern. <\/span><b>It gives the app information about people who are not even on the app. <\/b>The<span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> contact list can be shared with app developers and with people in a user\u2019s contact list. This affects privacy and contributes to the harassment culture.<\/span><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p><strong>\u00a0Read Also :-<a href=\"https:\/\/forumias.com\/blog\/privacy-issues-in-government-backed-apps\/\">Privacy Issues in government backed Apps<\/a><\/strong><\/p>\n<h5><b>How will the dominant companies in similar space react?<\/b><\/h5>\n<p><b><\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">The clubhouse is one of the numerous apps that have grown popular during the COVID-19 as people are looking for new methods to communicate with each other.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">As the popularity of Clubhouse grows, Twitter has launched \u2018Spaces\u2019, and Facebook is working on a similar feature. LinkedIn, Discord, Reddit and Spotify are doing the same.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><b>The conclusion<br \/>\n<\/b>Clubhouse might seem like a lightweight app, but it does not offer much in terms of securing privacy and data rights. It is not very different from traditional platforms. Social audio won\u2019t truly progress until innovation is balanced with respect for privacy, security and data rights.<b><\/b><\/p>\n<p><b>Source: <\/b><a href=\"https:\/\/epaper.thehindu.com\/Home\/ShareArticle?OrgId=GID8LGLRJ.1&amp;imageview=0\"><b>click here<\/b><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Synopsis: Privacy and data rights remain out of focus on social audio.\u00a0 Introduction The clubhouse is a new social networking app based around audio rooms. It crossed over 2 million Android downloads last month. The main feature of the app is the unique audio medium through which its users interact. This feature makes clubhouse different&hellip; <a class=\"more-link\" href=\"https:\/\/forumias.com\/blog\/privacy-and-data-rights-in-the-age-of-social-audio\/\">Continue reading <span class=\"screen-reader-text\">Securing privacy and data rights in the age of social audio<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":61,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1230,1351,1310,9],"tags":[1293],"class_list":["post-111633","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-9-pm-daily-articles","category-daily-news","category-daily-news-updates","category-public","tag-sec_1","entry"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","views":{"total":0,"cached_at":1700787236,"cached_date":1704954717},"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/forumias.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/111633","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/forumias.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/forumias.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/forumias.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/61"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/forumias.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=111633"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/forumias.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/111633\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/forumias.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=111633"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/forumias.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=111633"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/forumias.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=111633"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}