A common misconception around the surveillance state assumes our devices are listening to us. It seems like if you so much as mention feeling, say, bloated, suddenly your Instagram algorithm is sending you targeted ads for mushroom coffee, which supposedly is effective at reducing stomach inflammation (I may be speaking from experience). The truth is actually much more sinister. Tech companies have more or less foregone the requisite process of asking for our permission to collect our data, and now high-level metric tracking allows agencies to triangulate where we are, what we might like to buy, what our friends and family like to buy, and most concerning, the very intricate behavior of our spending.
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