Threats¶

Adversaries in the data garden aren’t just here for a stroll — they’re digging through the compost, rummaging under the mulch, and pulling up every root they can find. The ultimate aim? Exposure. But not the nice kind, like a bit of spring sun. No — this is the kind of exposure that turns anonymised data into personal profiles, behaviours into blueprints, and networks into neat little diagrams of who-knows-whom. Here’s how they get there:

Identity disclosure¶

The crown jewel of any data-harvesting expedition: matching the pseudonymous daffodil in your dataset to an actual person. This is the moment when an adversary looks at a string of identifiers and confidently says, “Ah yes, that’s Bob from Amsterdam.” De-anonymising someone’s identity is the point at which privacy is no longer theoretical — it’s personal.

Content disclosure¶

Sometimes, it’s not just who you are, but what you’ve got growing in your patch. Content disclosure is the unmasking of sensitive personal data: medical conditions, political leanings, sexuality, religious beliefs, memberships, and other protected petals. This includes things like identity documents and bank details — the kind of data that doesn’t belong in the wild unless you’re actively trying to be burgled.

Link disclosure¶

If you can’t quite identify the flower, try tracing the roots. Link disclosure is all about relationships: who talks to whom, who buys what, who follows which fertiliser brand on Instagram. Even if identities stay technically hidden, their connections often give the game away. It’s like identifying someone not by their name, but by recognising every plant in their allotment.

A new form of consent¶

Welcome to the great digital trade-off: you get cat videos, we get your data. Users click “Accept All” with the enthusiasm of someone dismissing a smoke alarm, and adversaries collect what they need — with your permission, technically. It’s not so much informed consent as it is ambient surrender.

Marketers bid more for your attention than you’d ever pay for the content you’re consuming, and the system knows it. So here we are: surrounded by cookies we never asked for, tracked by pixels we can’t see, and apparently fine with it, because the website loaded half a second faster. The garden isn’t gated — it’s wide open, and you’re agreeing to that every time you wander in.