The news that 311,127 people in Australia may have been caught up in the Cambridge Analytica scandal and had their Facebook information “improperly shared” with the data analytics company illustrates the reach of one of the greatest ethical challenges facing our generation; the potential of tech companies to deploy their expertise to influence users’ thoughts, feelings and behaviours. And to use this to influence our elections.

Such activities threaten our right to freedom of thought and democracy itself.

Tech has an ever increasing ability to get inside our heads and work out what we are thinking. In 2015, researchers reported that access to a user’s Facebook footprint allowed them more insight into that person's personality than their close friends and family. This basic approach was used by Cambridge Analytica when it accessed millions of Facebook profiles and used them to target people with personalised political advertisements.

Many social media users have had no idea exactly how much information about their inner world can be inferred from what they "like". Unfortunately, as we increasingly have to exchange our data for access to basic services, we may have little practical choice about whether we give access to our inner world.

Tech also actively aspires to break down the wall to our inner world. Last year Facebook announced plans for a “brain-computer interface” that would allow users’ thoughts to be decoded and transmitted straight to Facebook. We need to think about the implications of this technology before, not after, it is created.