Social Media Surveillance and Experiences of Authoritarianism
In the age of social media and surveillance capitalism, technologies of state and corporate surveillance have converged, and practices of surveillance mainly associated with totalitarian/authoritarian states have become commonplace also in commercial settings. Recent research suggests that the attitudes of citizens towards surveillance from social media are mixed, where media users, on the one hand, are sceptical, yet do very little in terms of protecting themselves through e.g. privacy settings. What role has the historical legacy of authoritarian experiences for the attitudes to corporate surveillance?
This project aims to analyse attitudes and concerns about corporate surveillance among citizens in three different cultural settings related to totalitarianism, authoritarianism and liberal democracy. Taking the example of post-Soviet Estonia, post-dictatorship Portugal, and long-term democracy Sweden, the project will, first, conduct a quantitative national survey in all three countries, establishing the attitudes towards corporate surveillance among generations brought up under authoritarian conditions, and younger generations without such experiences. Second, it will follow up the themes of the survey in focus group interviews in order to gain a deeper understanding of the ways in which the same groups of media users relate to corporate surveillance. The project thus contributes to our understanding of media user behaviour in surveillance capitalism.
Final report
The project aimed to analyze under which conditions media users accept commercial surveillance, or dataveillance, online on social media and in general internet usage, as well as to what extent experiences of state surveillance in countries with a history of totalitarian/authoritarian rule and associated surveillance systems had an impact on these attitudes: Estonia (with a background in the totalitarian Soviet era), Portugal (with a background in an authoritarian dictatorship), and Sweden (as a comparative reference point).
The project conducted a quantitative national survey in all three countries (n=3,221), to map attitudes towards surveillance on social media in two different generational cohorts where an older group with experiences of totalitarian/authoritarian surveillance was compared with a younger group without such experiences. This mapping was then followed up with focus group interviews aimed at achieving a deeper understanding of how different groups of media users related to surveillance and data collection of personal data and behavioral patterns on the internet. Through this, the project aimed to contribute to knowledge about media usage in the digitized society.
The project was led by a principal investigator (Bolin) with the assistance of two co-investigators: Professor Veronika Kalmus from the University of Tartu, Estonia, and Professor Rita Figueiras from Universidade Catolica Portuguesa, Lisbon in Portugal. Master's student Erik Björklund was employed as an assistant during a phase of data processing. The project proceeded as planned, particularly regarding the quantitative phase, while the Covid-19 pandemic made focus group interviews more complicated than usual, leading to their supplementation with individual interviews, especially in the older age group.
Regarding the project's findings, based on the quantitative part of the study, it can be concluded that education was the strongest explanatory factor for differences in attitudes towards data surveillance in all three countries. The cultural differences initially assumed to exist between the countries were significantly smaller than expected, although with some variations at a detailed level. The older generational cohort was found to be more tolerant towards state surveillance compared to the younger group in all three countries, while the reverse was true for commercial surveillance where the younger generation was more tolerant. Experience of state surveillance thus does not correlate with commercial surveillance. These results are reported in Kalmus et al. (2022).
One result stemming from the focus group interviews was that there were distinct differences in attitudes towards the characteristics of digital media and the explicit and latent metrics underlying the mapping of consumer groups online. These are reported in an upcoming article (Figueiras forthcoming).
Methodologically, the project also resulted in some conclusions regarding online focus group methodology, which are reported in Bolin et al. (2023). Unlike in a focus group interview with co-present interviewees, there are various considerations to take into account in an online setting, including the size of the interview group, the length of the interview, the group's internal dynamics, and the interviewer's role.
The project's starting points, i.e., that experiences of state repressive surveillance would influence attitudes towards commercial surveillance, could not be substantiated. Instead, the results suggest that global techno-cultural changes level regional cultural experiences and are more significant than these. This aspect is worth following up in future research, for example, by studying attitudes towards platform companies' collection of user data in a larger set of culturally varied contexts.
The project has disseminated its results through conference presentations, the publication of a final report, and publications in high-ranking peer-reviewed journals with Open Access.
The project conducted a quantitative national survey in all three countries (n=3,221), to map attitudes towards surveillance on social media in two different generational cohorts where an older group with experiences of totalitarian/authoritarian surveillance was compared with a younger group without such experiences. This mapping was then followed up with focus group interviews aimed at achieving a deeper understanding of how different groups of media users related to surveillance and data collection of personal data and behavioral patterns on the internet. Through this, the project aimed to contribute to knowledge about media usage in the digitized society.
The project was led by a principal investigator (Bolin) with the assistance of two co-investigators: Professor Veronika Kalmus from the University of Tartu, Estonia, and Professor Rita Figueiras from Universidade Catolica Portuguesa, Lisbon in Portugal. Master's student Erik Björklund was employed as an assistant during a phase of data processing. The project proceeded as planned, particularly regarding the quantitative phase, while the Covid-19 pandemic made focus group interviews more complicated than usual, leading to their supplementation with individual interviews, especially in the older age group.
Regarding the project's findings, based on the quantitative part of the study, it can be concluded that education was the strongest explanatory factor for differences in attitudes towards data surveillance in all three countries. The cultural differences initially assumed to exist between the countries were significantly smaller than expected, although with some variations at a detailed level. The older generational cohort was found to be more tolerant towards state surveillance compared to the younger group in all three countries, while the reverse was true for commercial surveillance where the younger generation was more tolerant. Experience of state surveillance thus does not correlate with commercial surveillance. These results are reported in Kalmus et al. (2022).
One result stemming from the focus group interviews was that there were distinct differences in attitudes towards the characteristics of digital media and the explicit and latent metrics underlying the mapping of consumer groups online. These are reported in an upcoming article (Figueiras forthcoming).
Methodologically, the project also resulted in some conclusions regarding online focus group methodology, which are reported in Bolin et al. (2023). Unlike in a focus group interview with co-present interviewees, there are various considerations to take into account in an online setting, including the size of the interview group, the length of the interview, the group's internal dynamics, and the interviewer's role.
The project's starting points, i.e., that experiences of state repressive surveillance would influence attitudes towards commercial surveillance, could not be substantiated. Instead, the results suggest that global techno-cultural changes level regional cultural experiences and are more significant than these. This aspect is worth following up in future research, for example, by studying attitudes towards platform companies' collection of user data in a larger set of culturally varied contexts.
The project has disseminated its results through conference presentations, the publication of a final report, and publications in high-ranking peer-reviewed journals with Open Access.