Surveillance in the digital enclosure

Text Exploration

In this article, the author argues that the metaphor of a digital “cloud” is purposefully misleading: it indicates that the data in the cloud is free, fleeting, and loose. Instead, a better metaphor is that of an enclosure. A digital enclosure is a restrictive container for data. The author describes that digital enclosures are proliferating, and are controlled by large corporations who have no intention or meaningful reason to let the data in the enclosure out. These corporations monitor the data, which means the data that is collected with or without the user’s knowledge, and the data has value.

This form of corporate “enclosure” is how the monitoring envelopes the user ecosystem. It is possible because content is no longer enclosed on someone’s personal device; instead, the data has been pushed outwards into a space that is out of their control. The author likens this to losing control over productive activity, similar to how a worker loses autonomy in a capitalist working environment. The enclosure is also compared to “land enclosure.”

The problem with a corporate enclosure is that ownership over data passes from someone who created it to someone who controls the enclosure, and the new owner is free to do whatever they would like with it (which often consists of advertising.) Living in a digital enclosure becomes normalized, primarily because a user receives some form of convenience. People have gotten used to such enclosures, and “the more ubiquitous such enclosures are, the more willing users will be to store an increasing range and quantity of personal data on them.” The author questions if consumers will realize that their exchange has led to financial benefit for a corporation, and if they will care.