"big data privacy" entries

A big reason why discussions of “big data” get complicated — and policy-makers resort to vague hand-waving, as in the well-known White House executive office report — is that its ripple effects travel fast and far. Your purchase, when recorded by a data broker, affects not only the the ads and deals they offer you in the future, but the ones they offer innumerable people around the country that share some demographic with you.

Policy-making might be simple if data collectors or governments could say, “We’ll collect certain kinds of data for certain purposes and no others” — but the impacts of data collection are rarely predictable. And if one did restrict big data that way, its value would be seriously reduced.

Follow my steps: big data privacy vs collection

Data collection will explode as we learn how to connect you to different places you’ve been by the way you walk or to recognize certain kinds of diseases by your breath.

When such data exhaust is being collected, you can’t evade consequences by paying cash and otherwise living off the grid. In fact, trying to do so may disadvantage you even more: people who lack access to sophisticated technologies leave fewer tracks and therefore may not be served by corporations or governments. Read more…