Why Are User Agreements so Long

Jonathan Obar of York University in Toronto and Anne Oeldorf-Hirsch of the University of Connecticut conducted a study to get an empirical idea of the extent to which consumers might be deceived. They created a fake social networking site called Name Drop and wrote an agreement about the terms of service and services that users could accept before signing up. In the agreement, they included the disclosure that users would abandon their firstborn as payment and that everything users shared would be passed on to the NSA. 98% of participants agreed. Still, once I got over the initial breach of agreements, I was able to relax a bit in the flow on Tuesday and learn a little more about the legal context behind these documents. After of course reading and accepting the Terms of Use of the Guardian (6,900 words, pretty standard stuff) and Buzzfeed (3,788 words, ditto), just to leave a few comments on each site. The questions asked of Zuckerberg during this hearing were based on the assumption that standard user agreements are informative to users. This is absurd, not least because it assumes that users read it. Aware of this, Congress seemed stuck on whether agreements should be simpler and more accessible or longer and more comprehensive. The terms of service are a legal document that protects the company and explains to consumers what rules apply when using the service, says Ray Walsh, chief privacy officer at ProPrivacy.com. A privacy policy, on the other hand, is a legal document that explains to users how their data is collected and used by the company and third parties or affiliates. Remember that if you click “I Agree” in these documents, your consent is legally binding. The availability of knowledge does not necessarily lead to informed and meaningful decisions.

Lawmakers prefer mandatory disclosures, such as warnings on cigarette packages, because they are cheap and compensate for “information inequality” — the reality that companies often know far more than consumers about the wisdom of making a decision. However, in this context, users are asked to consider the privacy implications of each publication they create – an incredibly complex calculation of future risks and consequences. Those who clicked were faced with a long user contract. There were malicious clauses buried in this agreement, such as one that gives your mother permission to check your internet browsing history and another that gives your firstborn the naming rights. Some have argued that the vast majority of legal phrases found in the information age are worth little more than the pixels on which they are written. Citing British common law, they point out that a valid contract must, at least theoretically, offer the possibility of negotiation. End user license agreements – the rules that govern the use of software and even hardware that has mostly already been purchased and paid for – violate this legal principle. Meanwhile, the longest privacy policy belongs to the online payment processor PayPal. You`ll need to take 53 minutes to fully understand what the company is doing with your personal information, according to Reboot.

Instead, legislators should focus their attention on the structure, aesthetics and functionality of the services themselves. The way platforms like Facebook are designed and the signals that interfaces, buttons, and icons send shape people`s behavior and expectations more than any hidden boilerplate. Padlock icons, privacy settings, and badges invite users, businesses, services, and technologies to trust. Some types of casual and playful web designs minimize the risk of online disclosure. Ephemeral media like Snapchat can make images seem like they`re disappearing, even if that`s not really true. Online services are usually designed to make you feel safe when sharing, even if you`re not. This isn`t the first time researchers have used tricks to make it clear that few people read all the terms of use, privacy policies, and other agreements that regularly appear on their screens. Perhaps the best marker of Apple`s little care about the terms of service that its users should read is found a few paragraphs below in the iCloud Terms of Service. (By the way, although it`s divided into separate documents, it`s all or nothing when it comes to accepting or rejecting terms.) The language is too complex and time-consuming for most, and apparently consumers easily accept that the worst thing most companies will do is sell their name and email address to a third party who wants to promote them. The recent debate over personal data, triggered by the revelations of Facebook and Cambridge Analytica, is long overdue and with it the revision of user agreements. At the April congressional hearing on the subject, lawmakers focused on Facebook`s terms of service and related privacy policies, as it is the only document that officially explains the company`s business model and describes the user`s relationship with Facebook.

The agreement aims to inform users of Facebook`s intentions with their data and to act as a mechanism that gives the company permission to continue. However, it is possible that the design of click-to-accept pages aggravates the problem. A few years ago, Rainer Böhme of UC Berkeley and Stefan Köpsell of the Technische Universität Dresden tested alternative formulations of a simple declaration of consent to more than 80,000 Internet users. .