Fashion, filter bubbles and echo chambers: questions of privacy, identity, and governance

ABSTRACT The discourse on filter bubbles and echo chambers applies to the use of social media analytics and consumer profiling for behavioural advertising in the fashion industry, this being relevant to an individual’s autonomy and control of personal information. However, we need to expand on the concept of filter bubbles and echo chambers to define the contours of self-exposure within the algorithmic context applied to the social and personal aspects of fashion. This paper claims that filter bubbles and echo chambers in fashion have an impact on the parameters and conditions of the right to privacy, influencing an individual’s perception and self-relationality. An analysis of the ECtHR’s interpretation of Article 8 of the ECHR Convention reveals that we need to shape notions of personal development and autonomy to include an individual’s plurality of needs, desires, and beliefs, as well as unconscious associations with fashion identity.