Hey there👋
Recently, I noticed something…a lot of people mix up security & privacy.
The internet throws around terms like security, privacy, encryption, anonymity, data protection like they’re interchangeable. They sound technical, important (a bit cool as well) But no one really slows down to explain what each one actually means - or why the differences matter.
I was in the same place not long ago. I thought I understood privacy in the digital world. Turns out, I didn’t. It wasn’t until 2025 that the gaps became obvious….
That’s what pushed me to write this piece.
The goal here is simple - Break down what privacy actually means, how it’s different from security, and why it matters beyond buzzwords and marketing language. We’ll look at it from multiple angles without assuming you already know the jargon.
Let’s get into it.
People unlock their phones dozens, sometimes hundreds of times a day. They share their location, contacts, habits, routines - all in exchange for convenience.
And then they wonder where their privacy went.
The irony is hard to miss.
We rant about surveillance and loss of control, but rarely acknowledge the part we played in it. The majority of us don’t even feel it happening anymore. We only wake up when something irreversible happens - something they can’t undo or forget.
And convenience is the real killer here.
In the digital world, it kills privacy.
In real life, it kills growth.
The reality is - We are wired for comfort & the moment something demands effort or thought, we avoid it. That’s how autopilot for our thinking becomes normal and later on…it affects tons of other areas of our life.
Think about it - In our modern society - decisions happen instantly. Accept. Allow. Skip. Agree. Our brains barely engage and this is really dangerous.
On top of that, we carry devices that track our location, sleep, steps, habits, and behavior patterns. Come to think of it - every activity of ours becomes a data point & this didn’t happen by accident. We literally designed a world where observation is the default and opted into it willingly.
Understanding Privacy and Security
Before we go deeper, clearing a very big misconception is important.
Yes, I am talking about privacy and security - sorry to surprise you but they are very different things. It’s not rocket science though, I have been there as well, not knowing the difference.
But here I am…
Let’s flip the switch for you as well.
What Privacy Really Means
First things first - privacy does not mean secrecy.
Privacy isn’t about hiding in the shadows or having something to be ashamed of. Privacy is simply about control. Control over who knows what about you, when they know it, and why they know it.
At its core, privacy is a basic human right. It’s your ability to draw boundaries around your personal information and decide how far those boundaries go. You don’t lose your right to privacy just because you live online.
Here’s a simple example:
You choose what photos to post on social media.
You decide whether to share your location.
You control who can see your profile.
That “act of choosing” is privacy.
Most people think privacy disappears only when data is leaked or hacked. That’s wrong. Privacy is lost much earlier - it’s gone the moment systems decide for you what gets collected, stored, and shared.
So when we talk about privacy, we’re not talking about hiding information.
We’re talking about owning your decisions and in today’s digital world, that ownership is constantly being challenged.
What Security Really Means
Security is the machinery behind protection.
You can say - Security is the technical and procedural methods used to protect your data from unauthorized access, misuse, or exposure.
Think encryption, authentication, access controls, network defenses…etc All these act as looks on doors and protect your data.
But here’s the distinction that matters: security enforces privacy, it doesn’t define it.
A simple example makes this clear. End-to-end encryption secures your messages so no third party can read them in transit. That encryption is security and the fact that only you and the recipient can read the message - That’s privacy.
Privacy vs Security - The Great Confusion
Most people mix these two up, and the tech industry benefits from that confusion.
Security is about defense, it keeps attackers and outsiders away. Privacy is about control, it decides what data exists in the first place and who’s allowed to use it.
You can have excellent security and terrible privacy at the same time.
That’s because security is easy to market. A lot of buzzwords in the security world trigger trust. Words like: “End-to-End encryption”, “Safe”...etc
On the other hand - Privacy isn’t so easy to market. It asks uncomfortable questions about data collection, tracking, and consent and because of that, it often gets ignored.
This leads to another problem - tons of people start to assume something dangerous: if an app is secure, it must be private too.
Hate to break it to you, but that assumption is wrong!
Google is the perfect example. Your account is highly secure, but your behavior, location & habits are still tracked. Basically all of it is working perfectly as intended. You’ve probably noticed the rise of the de-Google movement across the internet and it didn’t come out of nowhere. People are slowly waking up to what’s happening behind the scenes and realizing that convenience came with a long, silent bill.
Anyway, let’s pull this back to the core idea.
Privacy is the goal, security is the tool.
Security enforces rules, but privacy defines the rules.
And here’s a small but important tip for you going forward:
When choosing any app or platform - look for both. Strong security and clear privacy boundaries. One without the other is useless.
The “Nothing to Hide” Myth
“I have nothing to hide” sounds reasonable - until you think about it for more than five seconds.
We’re all human, none of us are hiding secret body parts under our clothes.
Still, you close the door when you shower.
Why?
Because privacy isn’t about secrets, it’s about boundaries.
The problem with the “nothing to hide” belief is that it ignores how surveillance works in the real world. Being constantly observed not only records your behavior, it also reshapes it - People start to speak less freely, think less boldly, conform more…
And when this happens in a long enough time frame - people start to become puppets who neither think for themselves nor question anything.
Here’s another question for the ones who say we have “nothing to hide”:
“Would you still say this, if every text you sent became public tomorrow?”
Probably not.
A major reason for the slow erosion of privacy is having an apathetic attitude. People with such an attitude slowly start to lose control and when they do that - someone else starts to take it - Corporations, Governments, Data brokers…etc
And trust me they won’t use your data the way you would.
The Chilling Effect: How Being Watched Changes Everything
When people know they’re being watched or even suspect they might be - their behavior starts to change…
They start to speak less.
They start to search less.
They start to avoid topics that might look suspicious.
This is a psychological phenomenon known as the chilling effect. The interesting thing is you don’t need any laws or arrests to enforce it. The possibility of scrutiny is enough.
After the Snowden revelations exposed the scale of NSA surveillance, researchers observed something telling: traffic to privacy-sensitive Wikipedia pages dropped noticeably, People started getting more cautious.
Similar shifts were seen in Google search behavior, where users avoided terms they believed could draw attention.
This is where the myth breaks.
Surveillance not only bad behavior, it basically stops all behavior that carries risk - including curiosity, dissent, and independent thought.
I’ve seen this play out in real life too.
In my institute, questioning ideas made me “that guy.” The one who didn’t agree. The one who thought too much. The punishment wasn’t explicit, but it was real enough that everything started to suffer - my grades, my reputation…etc
And the fix wasn’t improving arguments.
It was simply shutting up, I had to wear a sheep’s mask to survive.
Now scale that up.
Today, people get arrested for online speech. Others get flagged for using privacy-focused operating systems . Everyone sees what happens to the first few and the rest learn the lesson without being told:
I guess, this is the part defenders of surveillance miss.
A society that behaves only because it’s watched is a weak society and it only produces people who comply and never question.
How We Gave Our Data Away
Humans are wired for convenience.
Our brains naturally gravitate toward whatever feels easiest and demanding. If something removes friction, we adopt it without thinking twice.
The people pulling the strings understand this perfectly.
Modern apps are engineered with the help of behavioral psychologists who study how humans think and function. Every interaction is optimized to reduce resistance and increase compliance.
Notifications act as dopamine hooks.
Personalized ads target moments of human weaknesses
‘Accept all’ buttons are highlighted while privacy options are buried.
By itself, each function seems harmless but collectively, they add up to something bigger - a system where data is taken through comfort.
And that’s the key point.
We didn’t lose privacy because we didn’t care.
We lost it because convenience felt easier than control.
So - “Why do people keep using these apps?”
Because these apps work, they save time and they remove effort. And in a world optimized for speed, anything that slows you down feels like friction.
That is how we give our privacy away - bit by bit.
If you want to go deeper into how these trade-offs work and what’s actually going on behind the scenes to nudge you towards making choices that aren’t even yours, you should give the following pieces a read:
How Tech Eats Your Privacy
Privacy erosion today is gradual. Almost every tech product we touch takes a small bite out of it. Phones, cars, home assistants, smart TVs, fitness watches - nearly everything connected now collects, profiles, and reports back.
Take smart TVs. In 2025, Texas sued Samsung, LG, Sony, Hisense, and TCL for allegedly capturing screenshots of what users watch every couple of milliseconds and selling that data to advertisers. The tech behind this is called Automated Content Recognition (ACR).
In plain language - your TV was watching you watch it - snapping frames, sending them back to servers and building a complete profile on you without you knowing it.
I haven’t written a deep dive on this yet, but props to Secrets of Privacy - he breaks it down properly. If this interests you, read his piece here:
Now zoom out:
Rideshare apps track movement.
Health apps sell behavioral data.
Wearables log your body.
It’s the same pattern everywhere.
That is called surveillance creep and it’s powered by one thing - “data as currency.” And yes, this involves your data.
The Global Picture: Weak Laws, Strong Watchers
When people talk about privacy, they often frame it as a personal problem.
But this is a global not a personal problem.
In the West, surveillance is market-driven. Liberal democracies like the US, EU, UK, and Canada outsource data collection to Big Tech. Companies harvest behavior at scale, while governments lean on legal access.
The EU is often cited as a privacy leader, yet even there, anonymity is literally dying. Digital ID systems are being normalized, and proposals like chat control show how quickly safeguards bend when power demands it.
If you want to understand that trajectory, I would recommend checking out the following pieces:
Anyway, back to the topic.
In the East, surveillance is state-centric. Countries like China, parts of Russia, and Iran don’t hide the model. Monitoring is centralized and control is explicit.
Basically these countries don’t even try to hide what they are doing.
Then there’s the Global South - Pakistan, India, Africa…etc These regions simply absorb the rules and comply with them.
And guess what you get in result?
A Western-style corporate data extraction paired with Eastern-style state overreach, with almost no legal protection against either.
Another important thing is that – such regions have massive populations, cheap smartphones, weak enforcement of privacy laws…etc. That makes them low-risk environments for experimenting with invasive systems at scale.
Companies roll aggressive data collection, default opt-ins, preloaded apps, and surveillance-friendly features without facing lawsuit or fines backlash and once these systems work - they’re refined and later enforced in other regions as well.
And on top of all this - we also have the illusion of consent.
Cookie banners, consent popups, dark patterns - systems designed to look like choice while guaranteeing compliance. In result you get - weak laws, powerful watchers, and a digital ecosystem that extracts maximum control while pretending to ask permission.
Why Privacy Still Matters
If you’re still here, good. That already puts you ahead of the autopilot majority.
I get it, you must be getting all sorts of questions…
“Does privacy even matter now?”
“Can we even do anything about it?”
“Should we just give up?”
I would advise you to shut out those voices for now.
And keep in mind that - Privacy still matters because behavior changes under observation. When people know they’re being watched, they start to self-censor. Over time, that turns into compliance and eventually, individuality fades. You stop acting like yourself and start acting in ways that feel safe and acceptable.
This is called conditioning and that is what will happen when you give up.
So keep fighting and know that - Privacy is the right to decide who you are without invisible systems nudging and scoring every move you make. And without privacy, you don’t get to choose who you are.
If you’re wondering where the solutions are, don’t panic, slow down…
This was just a foundational piece and I’d strongly recommend reading this next to build a solid baseline:
From here, I’ll be rolling out a privacy guide series – I’ll be explaining how to reclaim control, reduce exposure and take back control of your digital life.
This is just the beginning.
Stay tuned.
Share what you think below.
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