Privacy is an increasingly feeble constituent of the present datafied world and apparently the reason for that is clear: powerful actors worked to invade everyone's privacy for commercial and surveillance purposes. The existence of those actors and their agendas is undeniable, but the explanation is overly simplistic and contributed to create a narrative that tends to preserve the status quo. In this essay, I analyze several facets of the lack of online privacy and idiosyncrasies exhibited by privacy advocates, together with characteristics of the industry mostly responsible for the datafication process and why its asserted high effectiveness should be openly inquired. Then I discuss of possible effects of datafication on human behavior, the prevalent market-oriented assumption at the base of online privacy, and some emerging adaptation strategies. In the last part, the regulatory approach to online privacy is considered. The EU's GDPR is praised as the reference case of modern privacy regulations, but the same success hinders critical aspects that also emerged, from the quirks of the institutional decision process, to the flaws of the informed consent principle. A glimpse on the likely problematic future is provided with a discussion on privacy related aspects of EU, UK, and China's proposed generative AI policies.

翻译：隐私在当今数据化世界中日益脆弱，其原因看似显而易见：强大的行为体出于商业和监控目的，不断侵犯每个人的隐私。这些行为体及其动机的存在无可否认，但这种解释过于简单化，并助长了一种倾向于维持现状的叙事。本文分析了在线隐私缺失的多个层面以及隐私倡导者表现出的独特特征，同时探讨了主导数据化进程的行业特性，以及其宣称的高效性为何应受到公开质疑。随后，本文讨论了数据化对人类行为的可能影响、在线隐私中普遍存在的以市场为导向的假设，以及一些新兴的适应策略。最后一部分探讨了在线隐私的监管路径。欧盟的《通用数据保护条例》被誉为现代隐私法规的典范，但其成功也掩盖了诸多关键问题——从制度决策过程的怪癖，到知情同意原则的缺陷。通过讨论欧盟、英国和中国拟议的生成式人工智能政策中与隐私相关的方面，本文展望了未来可能面临的困境。