One point that I think comes too short in every discussion on privacy is that you are not always in control of your data and you never can be fully. Say we con

One point that I think comes too short in every discussion on privacy is that you are not always in control of your data and you never can be fully. Say we consider a privacy-paranoid individual who is taking great care not to put his personal data online. And then we take a look at his or her parents or friends or colleagues who most certainly will keep his or her real name bundled with phone number(s) and (e-mail) address(es) in their address book synced to their Google or Apple or Microsoft account. It just happens, there is only so much you can do about it. Your data is out there and it's only the question of the security measures the data holder implemented that's keeping it safe. (Basically, it's nothing new, many people have your data, but possibly only in the "offline world" -- think insurance, prospective or current employers, even your go-to car repair guy. It's just that we normally have a law for protecting the offline data and ways to enforce it and almost nothing alike in the online world.) Privacy is something that has to be enforced on a population, and not simply recommended to an individual. The only institution that can reasonably do that is the government, by introducing data protection laws, abiding by them and allowing a third-party to verify they really keep their promise. Until then, we might not have a choice.