We have significantly more privacy in the modern era than people did hundreds of years ago. Most of us live in cities large enough that no one will know that you've been to the doctor, what you bought from the butcher or who you spend your time hanging out with. If you think it's easy for people to find out that someone is pregnant now, it was absolutely effortless in 1714. It's common for people to spend days commuting to work and going out to eat and socialize without running into anyone that they know. In the past there was almost no privacy for anyone. People lived in a world comprised of dozens of people and saw many of them every day.

Are we moving into a scary new era of data collection and prediction, or cycling back to an old world where it's hard to keep secrets because everyone knows everyone else? Big Data is no more of a threat to privacy than Small Town used to be. But in modern society we have the option to opt out. Or at the very least, use Tor or private browsing and avoid social media. We have the ability to live with a level of anonymity that our ancestors would deeply envy. The only thing stopping us is our own desire to participate in services and online communities designed specifically to collect and broadcast information about ourselves.

Why do we do it? Because we really like it. Our cultural roots lie in societies where supposed secrets traveled fast and everyone knew if someone was pregnant or gay or searching for information about strange topics. Even when we're able to hide ourselves in crowds of strangers we invent new ways to connect to each other and broadcast our statuses and purchase habits to as many people as possible. Everything old is new again, and instead of trying to hide on social media we should focus on figuring out how to take advantage of new technology to give ourselves the level of privacy that we want. Modern data collection presents challenges, but challenges that we can overcome to create a world that is better than the one we came from.