For more on the origin of this Gadget Imperialism that began in America see: No One to Blame but Us
Privacy? Arrey baba, that word itself has become like Doordarshan — exists only in history books! Today our gadgets have eaten it alive. From morning tea till we snore at night, somebody is watching, recording, and storing. And we still ask, “But where did my privacy go?” Where else, yaar—it has already been packed in a suitcase and sold on OLX long ago.
Privacy has gone on permanent vacation — and there’s no return ticket!
People think this started with Facebook or WhatsApp. Wrong, ji! The real drama began much earlier, in America, when even mobile phones were looking like bricks. There, big companies quietly started collecting data about who is buying diapers and who is buying beer, who is dieting and who is eating secret samosas at midnight. Now see, even before your wife knows, Amazon is suggesting a treadmill to you.
It’s all a data game, my friend — privacy was just a checkbox we never unchecked!
And what are governments doing? Same like that strict aunty in the colony — saying, “We are protecting you, beta,” but actually keeping double watch. They say it’s to save us from being “abused” by technology. Wah! Meanwhile they are busy treating us like onions in a mandi — cutting, peeling, and selling our data layer by layer.
The aunty says she cares — but she’s really running full-time surveillance duty!
Now look at us Indians. Earlier, neighbours used to know everything about us — “Sharmaji’s son failed in maths, Gupta aunty’s daughter ran away with dance teacher.” At least that was limited to colony gossip. But now, thanks to mobile phones, watches, fridges, even mixer-grinder, everyone from Silicon Valley to Singapore knows what we eat, what we buy, what we dream, and how many steps we walked to the bathroom.
Earlier the neighbourhood knew our secrets — now even the motherboard does!
And then we complain: “AI is spying on us!” Arrey wah, what a joke! We ourselves are the ones begging AI to tell jokes, translate film songs, edit our articles, design one cute cartoon, and even remind us to drink water. In short, we are paying the thief to rob us — with full VIP treatment.
We invited the thief ourselves — now what’s the point shouting “Thief! Thief!”?
Honestly, the only people who still have privacy in India today are those who don’t have a mobile phone. And we all know what we call them — “backward, illiterate, out of touch.” So, no phone, no problem — but also no respect. Baap re!
In the digital world, being offline is the ultimate sin!
Now add AI to this chutney. Already we are reduced to data points; with AI, we are chutney powder. Tomorrow AI will probably know our mood swings better than our spouse. (Actually, many husbands are secretly praying for that.)
AI will stick to you like your shadow — goodbye privacy, farewell individuality!
So, what’s the moral of the story? Simple. We human beings created this mess ourselves. But instead of blaming our own greed for convenience, we happily pass the buck — sometimes to America, sometimes to Google, sometimes even to poor ChatGPT. Typical Indian style: “Galti meri, lekin dosh tumhara.”
The moral? We clicked ‘Agree’ — and handed over our soul in small print!
The end? Nahi boss — this story is “to be continued,” every time we say “I agree” without reading the terms!
Hyderabad, October 4, 2025
No One to Blame but Us
We all know how modern gadgets have almost erased the idea of privacy from our lives. But this erosion began long before smartphones and social media. Its roots go back to the early 2000s, when corporations quietly began turning human behavior into data.
Charles Duhigg, in The Power of Habit, describes how the American retail giant Target started studying its customers’ shopping habits to uncover intimate details about their personal lives. Andrew Pole, a data expert at Target, was asked “to build mathematical models that could crawl through data and determine which households contained kids and which were dedicated bachelors; which shoppers loved the outdoors and who was more interested in ice cream and romance novels.”[1]
Soon, Pole’s challenge became even more invasive—identifying which customers were pregnant. As Duhigg notes, “figuring out who was pregnant could make Target millions of dollars.”[2] By analyzing subtle changes in purchases—like unscented lotion or calcium supplements—Target could predict pregnancy before a woman had even told her family. The company would then mail her coupons for baby clothes or cribs, sometimes revealing the news to others before she did.
Pole eventually learned that “hiding what you know is sometimes as important as knowing it,” because “not all women are enthusiastic about a computer program scrutinizing their reproductive plans.”[3] As he admitted, “Not everyone, it turns out, thinks mathematical mind reading is cool.”[4]
By that time, Target’s systems already linked each customer to a Guest ID containing “demographic information … age, marital status, children, neighborhood, income estimate, websites visited, credit cards used, and phone numbers.”[5] Data brokers went even further, selling information on political views, reading habits, body type, and even religious preferences.[6]
As data researcher Tom Davenport warned, “It used to be that companies only knew what their customers wanted them to know. That world is far behind us.”[7]
That world he spoke of is completely gone now. The line between convenience and surveillance has disappeared. Every online action—every search, click, or pause—is a data point for someone’s algorithm.
The only person who may still possess some privacy is one without a mobile phone. For everyone else, privacy is an illusion. We have become transparent beings, visible to machines that never sleep.
If corporations could predict pregnancies two decades ago, what more can artificial intelligence do today—when it can read faces, moods, and voices, and even mimic our identity?
It seems there is truly no more privacy—only the quiet surrender of our lives to systems that know us too well.
Hyderabad, October 4, 2025
Notes
- Charles Duhigg, The Power of Habit: Why We Do What We Do and How to Change It (London: Random House, 2013 [2012]), p. 184.
- Ibid., p. 184.
- Ibid., p. 184.
- Ibid., p. 184.
- Ibid., pp. 187–188.
- Ibid., p. 188.
- Ibid., p. 188.
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