Data Privacy - Are you Protected or Powerless?
Nearly all aspects of our lives are now entwined with Data and its subsequent uses; many of which we remain uninformed about.
In the latest US court case, General Motors have been accused of collecting and subsequently selling data to insurers relating to "bad" habits of motorists.
The state of Texas is suing GM over allegations that they had installed technology to capture data of more than 14 million vehicles to create "driving scores" of over 1.8 million drivers in Texas.
The aforementioned "Bad" habits range from driving too fast or late at night, not wearing a seatbelt, and other habits my mum warned me not to replicate when behind the wheel.
Whilst it is unclear whether the data has been used to increase insurance premiums, Texas attorney general Ken Paxton said in a statement "Companies are using invasive technology to violate the rights of our citizens in unthinkable ways".
The alleged "egregious business practices" have far-reaching ethical and legal concerns to not only the safety of our data, but the potential consequences in its usage. In a world where data is now so integral to our lives, the question is raised whether you really know if and how your data is being used beyond your knowledge. The ramifications of which could severely impact consumers ethically, economically and politically.
Can we trust that our data is not being used maliciously? Whilst I understand US and UK law vary wildly from one another, the fact that consumers can be totally unaware of this practice is quite scary. As we move further into a digitised world, how much of our personal can be collected to be used to the advantage of businesses or other institutions?
In subsequent articles I'm hoping to share news and interesting articles regarding Data, please feel free to share your thoughts or opinions in the comments below! (This comes with a 100% AI-free text guarantee, so you know its really me).
#data #dataprivacy #dataprotection