Targeted Advertising

The use of targeted advertising by companies and search engines is a result of our lives becoming more centered on the internet than other advertising mediums. Being able to track and advertise to a consumer specifically is much more economical and efficient for companies than spending money on billboards and TV commercials that people may not see, but it is dangerous for the consumer.

            While it is just “business as usual” for companies, targeted advertising can be a very disturbing thing for consumers to be involved in. The scariest thing about being tracked online is its unbelievable accuracy, such as on YouTube during election campaigns there are advertisements specifically for your congressional districts. Regardless of the intent, it’s not a good feeling to know that there are databases out there that have information about your online viewing history, which could also be very personal. If the information from these companies gets hacked or sold to the wrong person, a person’s privacy could easily be compromised. Situations and potential mistakes such as these are why targeted advertising is dangerous to the everyday consumer. It’s not easy to be able to avoid being targeted, as just about everything that is sold in stores can be found cheaper online which makes the audience at risk even greater.

            Being targeted by online advertisers and potentially losing our sense of privacy is just a price that we as a society have paid in order to become more connected and more efficient. Buying products from Amazon and online just in general has become much cheaper and convenient as those packages can just be sent to our houses instead of having to go physically buy them. With technology also advancing to the stages where more and more people spend time online reading newspapers and watching TV shows instead of paying outrageous bills, it just makes it that much more appealing to spend time online. With fewer people watching TV and reading newspapers it just makes sense for companies to advertise more online through targeting consumers. By targeting and tracking people online it allows companies to get almost a sure thing by advertising only to people that are actually interested rather than just advertising to everyone like they do TV. While it’s just good business for them, it is a dangerous habit that really runs the risk of invading people’s privacy.    

            Targeted advertising is an evil that we as a society have brought on ourselves by spending more time online. Having our information tracked and saved puts our privacy at great risk without us even knowing.