I was drawn into the SAFE network for the same idea you were… that user’s would own their data and be able to control what applications were allowed to access and could do with the data as well.
Unfortunately, at least for me, a recent inquiry I posted to the community has convinced me that the SAFE network is not really going to be able to satisfy this particular objective.
Is SAFE still an overlay network? - Features - Safe Network Forum (safenetforum.org)
Yes, a user will be able to control the access that an application is granted to your SAFE data, however it doesn’t appear that the SAFE network will impose any constraints on what an application can do with that data once it has access. It is entirely possible that applications will siphon off that data and store it for their own usage as well as meta and tracking data, not really much differently than they do now.
This isn’t to say that the SAFE network doesn’t provide value for a lot of other objectives. It will be a remarkable advance in the technology of decentralized/distributed data. It just isn’t going to change in any meaningful how an average user’s data is exploited and their activities are tracked because it leaves it in the hands of individual users to determine which applications they can trust.
IMHO the vast majority of the loss of control over data and privacy for most user’s is not someone hacking in some backdoor to steal their data… more likely they have given it away to run applications they genuinely want to use, often for free. In general, application developers feel entitled to user data, and their right to monetize it as compensation for the functionality you get from using their application. Hey, and I am sure many of them inform you about what they are doing with your data is right there on Page 14 of the Terms and Conditions link in the footer… if only anyone would read it.