Whilst “The Social Dilemma” explores the ways in which era corporations use social knowledge for political benefit, 2019’s “The Great Hack” takes a a lot more in-depth have a look at this in its focal point on the fashionable scandal surrounding Cambridge Analytica. That includes outstanding reporters, educators, and previous staff, “The Great Hack” is an in depth and stark exploration of the facility of information.
Framed via the 2016 U.S. election and the U.Ok.’s Brexit referendum, the documentary delves into Cambridge Analytica and how this corporate mined treasured knowledge — predominantly by way of Fb — to goal not sure citizens. Cambridge Analytica constructed detailed profiles of customers in line with knowledge that used to be readily to be had or willingly given online (underneath the auspices of filling out a “character take a look at”). On this means, the corporate used to be ready to create focused campaigns peddling extra excessive affairs of state onto other folks’s newsfeeds to convince them to vote in a specific means.
“The Social Dilemma” rather parodies this concept, with the nature of Ben focused with content material via the fictitious political staff, Excessive Heart. They are going to had been fictional, however “The Great Hack” proves that complicated algorithms do exist to attempt to sway any person’s affairs of state. The extra you devour, the extra content material you notice, and the higher the divides in society develop into. Each movies additionally discover the speculation of social media customers and their knowledge being a commodity, with former construction director for Cambridge Analytica, Brittany Kaiser, going so far as pronouncing that knowledge has develop into extra treasured than oil. With the sensation that we’re powerless to regulate how our knowledge is used and abused, “The Great Hack” serves as an efficient cautionary story in regards to the risk of self sustaining, robust giant tech corporations.
