(And here some people thought misaligned GAI was the biggest threat to human society. But more mundane misalignment problems can crop up anywhere I guess)
I'm not sure how to prevent these kind of shenanigans, but it simply comes back to sweet adtech dollars I think. The industry is so huge and pervasive now, that regulating it back into submission is going to be very difficult. 10 years ago, regulation could've been passed that simply prevented adtech from ever becoming as normalized and intrusive as it is these days. Doing it now will cause a massive hit to the valuation of the industry, and these kind of moves tend to be unpopular. Who is going to pull off a campaign that erases hundreds of billions of dollars from the US stock market (and thus people's pensions)?
We can all pontificate about acting differently in their shoes, but I'm honest enough to admit that I wouldn't :D