Reading a Day's Privacy Policies Would Take Families Over Ten Working Days

A new white paper by the Web3 Foundation titled "Everyday Surveillance" examined the privacy policies that a typical family encounters in a single day of digital activity. Researchers built six model households across the United Kingdom and the United States, locating 1,195 relevant documents from 143 companies and institutions. The combined text contains 1,184,835 words, requiring about 83 hours—or more than ten eight-hour workdays—to read in full.

This volume surpasses the complete works of William Shakespeare by 34 percent. The study found that 83% of the policies permit using personal data for marketing, 80% allow data combination, 71% authorize sharing with commercial partners, and at least 24% mention training AI systems. While the authors note the analysis is not a comprehensive national survey, they argue the sheer length functions as a form of concealment. Gavin Wood and Bill Laboon of the Web3 Foundation suggest the findings raise questions about redesigning services to prove necessity without exposing all underlying data.