On Tuesday, March 28, in a landmark decision, both the Senate and House of Representatives repealed the FCC’s (Federal Communications Commission) regulations for ISPs (Internet Service Providers) negotiated by President Obama in 2015. Both internet and phone services are now labeled as public utilities, and are no longer privy to just users. With all the technical jargon over with, let’s have a real talk. What does this mean to you, and why should you be worried about it?

First, what is Net Neutrality? Net Neutrality is the basic concept that all ISPs must provide content independent of the source and should not show bias when displaying results. While the concept is fairly basic, there are other legal ramifications that Net Neutrality hits, the one you, the consumer, should be worried about: privacy. In order to not favor particular products or businesses when internet services are being used (especially in ads), ISPs must refrain from doing something crucial to their business-collecting data. If they were to collect your data, they would be able to tailor their ads based on your interests, thereby violating the rules of Net Neutrality. This was the industry norm, until Monday.

With the repealing of Net Neutrality, ISPs now have access to all of your data. The info being collected before was only being collected by private businesses like Google and Yahoo, but it can now be collected by basically anyone (including the government). They can pull up emails, read text messages, even retrieve things that “disappear from the grid,” like Snapchat. To be fair, they are only using them to “tailor ads to your interests,” but let’s be real. What is to stop the government from asking for our data from ISPs now? ISPs now have the freedom to listen, record, and collect your phone calls, emails, etc. In the name of business, the information can be sold to anyone-including the government. While the act does still need to be signed by President Trump to pass, it looks highly probable that the act will end up coming to fruition.

As a consumer, there are ways to protect yourself. Installing a Virtual Private Network looks like a must at this point. While VPNs cannot hide all of your data, a reasonable amount will be encrypted and harder to crack into.  Additionally, being vigilant of the mediums through which you send information can help. For example, texting your dad your bank account information through iMessage is probably not the smartest idea. Lastly, be aware of what you post online. Anything you send someone now is legally open to the government, and can be used against you. Yes, the government is trying to bully their way to our information — but if you know your options, there are always ways to counteract.