The 5 W's of Data Collection (Part 1)

The answer to the question of when and where your data being collected through is what makes this topic such an important process to understand.

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On average, the world’s internet user spends around 6 hours and 42 minutes online each day (Kemp, 2010), and statistics show that Millenials on average check their phone at least 150 times a day (Brandon, 2017). As the ways we interact with the World Wide Web grow with the mediums and devices we use, so does the amount of channels where these first and third party trackers have opportunities to collect inform it is absolutely important that we understand the role that our data plays in our growing interactions with the emergence of Web 2.0.

How is this data actually collected? Whenever you go to any website or app connected to the internet, the owners of that website or app immediately through the use of  cookies, which can be understood as pieces of code embedded on your computer through your browser, websites are able to identify each unique user and then record your interactions with their websites, These are called first party cookies. These cookies are what enable you to have a personalized experience like Amazon remembering what you put in your shopping cart since your last visit, or when websites.

Third party cookies on the other hand are set on our computers by advertising networks that work with the websites you visit and then track your movements across the web in order to effectively tailor the advertisements that appear for you. This is what provides us with banner ads on websites for the jacket we just searched on google about, or instagram ads for things we clicked on or showed interest in on another website. Check out part 2 to find out who is interested in this data, how they use it, and why it’s important to understand the data collection to advertising process.