The Road to A Data Driven Society

Just read this article from Deloitte consulting's Chris Arkenberg, Heather Rangel and David Jarvis about the role of data in building a strong digital society.

Besides making some solid arguments for data privacy, they argue for some sensible regulating of "data hoarders" a.k.a largest data-driven companies such as social media/messaging platforms and now in a Covid19 ravaged world, video sharing/broadcasting platforms. They conclude well that in a world where data is the new oil, the largest data driven companies are many times more valuable than the largest energy companies, yet, just as dirty oil does not burn well, there is a case to be made for clean and shareable data that helps society prosper - that would be a truly just, equitable and valuable digital society! They rightly argue that consumers, businesses and governments have the onus to collaborate to make such a utopian scenario possible.

The part where the underbelly of a data driven digital society becomes "murky" if not downright "dirty" is where data brokers procure data in opaque, sometimes illegal means without the knowledge and concurrence of the rightful owner of such data, ad-exchange networks and nebulous aggregators monetize such data in complex ways that even the most stringent regulations and diligent regulators (data protection authority is one of the authors recommendation) would find extremely hard to fathom and regulate - especially because the technology landscape that engenders these brokers and networks is constantly changing. It will be a classic game of whack-a-mole, even if such collaboration as the authors recommend, actually happens between all the stakeholders.

This is a way too complex issue to offer pat solutions, but three possible areas where solutions may emerge: 1. innovation on the front end where data originates to ensure opt-in for any data that may potentially be monetized 2. control on the proliferation and exchange of pseudonymized cookies across businesses that were not the original recipients of the data and 3. where possible, emergence of open data exchanges that anonymize/de-personalize and share data across users, businesses and governments for legitimized uses, paid or free (where social need warrants such sharing e.g. population health data solving Covid19).

#digitaltransformation #datadrivensociety #dataprivacy