Societal pressure and awareness --- Indeed, there are examples of societal pressure (mainly by hyper-active and influential advocacy group like Privacy International or EFF) which manage to change certain decisions of companies. Similar example was the pressure on Zoom, as it became ultra-popular, to introduce end-to-end encryption.

But there still seems to be lack of the pressure from the broader community of users - they (or, we) prefer fancy features, shiny look, and low costs than security and privacy. This ranges from IoT devices to Facebook (how many people have really ever abandoned Facebook due to Cambridge Analytica or recent whistleblower revelations? numbers tell almost none...).

How do we increase awareness of users, and boost their interest for demand of more secure products? Who should play what the role in this - regulators, user organisations, even companies themselves?

Source author: Vladimir Radunovic vladar@diplomacy.edu