New technology has opened up new possibilities far beyond what your word of mouth example has. Megacorps are sucking up data on a mass scale and using it for evil such as manipulating elections, tricking you in to buying stuff and reporting your every action to the government.
For this reason we need to think beyond the old ways of dealing with data.
Yes, the reality has changed. We have to either adapt our notions of privacy etc. to the new reality or pretend that nothing really changed. The latter seems to work, but one day you go to Africa (or India, or China, or just have to deal with someone who can ignore/circumvent the regulation), and - surprise! - the reality is still there.
For this reason we need to think beyond the old ways of dealing with data.