Who Else Is Watching You? The Business Behind Your Digital Life

Imagine checking WhatsApp, scrolling through TikTok, searching for a job, sending mobile money and looking for a loan. You have simply lived an ordinary African day, like millions do.

Yet each interaction may leave a digital trace. Together, traces can reveal interests, routines, approximate location, spending habits and what attracts your attention.

Your phone is not merely a communication device. It is also a sensor, a record of behaviour and potentially a source of commercial value.

Who collects information about you?

Platforms such as Google, Meta and TikTok can collect searches, clicks, viewing activity, device details, location and advertising interactions, depending on their services, settings and the permissions you grant. Even time spent watching a video can help a platform understand what holds your attention.

Advertisers and data brokers may combine or trade information from online activity and commercial records. Some apps share information with advertising or analytics companies, making permissions important even when an app seems harmless.

Telecommunications companies retain network and connection records, including certain location metadata; this does not mean they can automatically read encrypted messages. Different organisations see different parts of your digital life, sometimes combining information from several sources.

How do you become a digital profile?

Consider someone in Kampala, Kigali, Nairobi or Lagos searching for work. They visit job websites, watch career advice, search for loans and browse business opportunities. Over time, these signals can suggest their interests and likely needs.

Cookies can connect activity across websites; advertising identifiers may link activity to a device. Location information, where collected, can reveal patterns about where someone spends time. Profiles can be wrong, but even imperfect inferences may influence which advertisements, offers or content someone sees.

Why is this information valuable?

Businesses want to predict what people might do next. Advertisers seek likely customers; platforms seek engagement; companies analyse demand and improve services.

Data can improve services in transport, healthcare, agriculture and finance. But information about interests or financial vulnerability is commercially powerful. Engagement systems may promote content that keeps people watching, even when misleading. Political campaigns can target different messages to different audiences, sometimes without people understanding why.

The question is who uses the data, for what purpose, and with what consequences.

What does this mean for Africa?

The GSMA estimates mobile technologies and services contributed approximately $240 billion to Africa’s economy in 2025. Yet almost one billion Africans were not using mobile internet that year. Digital opportunity and exclusion exist side by side.

There is no single reliable figure for foreign-app downloads across Africa, and data location varies by provider and service. Information may be stored locally but processed using foreign-owned software or infrastructure.

Foreign platforms bring real benefits. But who builds products from African data, decides how it is used, and captures the value? This is not an argument against foreign technology or every overseas transfer. It is a case for fair rules and stronger African capability.

The African Union’s Convention on Cyber Security and Personal Data Protection entered into force in 2023, but effective protection requires national laws, enforcement and public awareness.

The question we should all ask

Africans generate information through commerce, communication and work. It can support valuable services and stronger economies, but participation should not mean surrendering control over how information is used. Privacy is not about hiding something. It is about having a say in what happens to information about your life.

The next time you download a free app, ask: if I am not paying with money, what information am I providing, what does the company do with it, and do I have a meaningful choice? That is not paranoia. It is digital literacy.

James Kaliisa is Co Founder & CTO of Nexus Inc., a Rwandan deep tech company building sovereign artificial intelligence infrastructure and digital systems for Africa.

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