Ultimately, Veale says, Big Tech companies are trying to position themselves so that they decide what people’s information rights are and what information they should provide to people. Veale highlights tech companies’ “download your data” services, which provide people with their posts, photos, and other data, but appear to avoid providing other forms of data such as analytical information. “We don’t really know the extent of information that’s collected by these companies,” Veale says. “The real core problem is that these companies disguise things that look like information rights behind fake user interfaces.”

I'm reminded of someone some years ago who requested their data from Spotify, and had to do back-and-forthing to then finally get what he wanted. And what he got was very detailed about him. Pretty sure much more detailed than what Spotify would usually give to its users requesting their data.