Eric Schmidt, Executive Chair Google

Surveillance capitalism, in Shoshana Zuboff’s formulation, is a new form of capitalism that works by creating surplus value from the data extracted from people in digital environments (which today is much more than just being online but includes driving your internet-capable car for example: the Internet of Everything).

Now, data about where we are, where we’re going, how we’re feeling, what we’re saying, the details of our driving, and the conditions of our vehicle are turning into beacons of revenue that illuminate a new commercial prospect.

According to Zuboff’s analysis, surveillance capitalism was invented by companies like Google and Facebook in the Internet era. We’ve heard before how these companies treat you as the product rather than the customer, but Zuboff aims to show that users are “a means to profits in a new kind of marketplace in which users are neither buyers nor…