Co-authored by Stacy Feiner and Lorri Slesh*

A recent "60 Minutes" exposé revealed how automatic updates and connected devices quietly intrude on privacy. One car owner who purchased GM’s OnStar system primarily for safety discovered that his driving habits were being secretly shared with insurers. This unauthorized practice caused his premiums to rise, costing him hundreds of dollars while lining the pockets of insurers. Even worse, the data was misinterpreted, turning an everyday convenience into unjust surveillance.

This is not happening in a vacuum. We’ve been lulled into convenience, which has crept into manipulation. The more technology advances, the more access becomes entrapment. Today, participation creates exposure, leaving us vulnerable.

We’re not advocating a return to landlines, trip tickets, or cassette tapes. Convenience and personalization, including AI, are likely here to stay—but they demand new ethical guardrails. AI now permeates public infrastructure, commerce, education, healthcare, and social systems. Its impact on autonomy, privacy, and personal agency is profound.

Technology has historically been framed as benefiting humanity, not harming it. AI isn’t new: the term was coined by John McCarthy in 1955. In 1983, intelligent gameplay computers were introduced to the U.S. via the movie "War Games." By 2011, Siri, Alexa, and IBM Watson entered our homes. Today, generative AI, including OpenAI agents and ChatGPT, is increasingly popular.

As consumers, we have lost control over the pace of technology adoption. Everett Rogers’ adoption curve once gave us a familiar rhythm: early adopters, early majority, late majority, and laggards. Today, AI is compressing that curve, replacing choice with forced consent—fueled by constant push notifications, covert data collection, and unauthorized selling of personal information. Platforms like Google, LinkedIn, and Facebook embed AI in ways that deliberately make it nearly........

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