Data analytics and privacy: do they know too much?
The world of internet connectivity offers a plethora of advantages for individuals, consumers and organisations. However, connectivity is an exchange of data and data sharing can raise an infamous concern of data privacy. As the world becomes ever more connected and people become more dependant on the exchange of information, data privacy is likely to become increasingly important.
How much of your data is being collected?
Most digital devices now interact with the Internet as technologies such as IoT, AI, AR, and VR are introduced. These smart devices now share data to the Internet for various purposes, including monitoring, controlling, learning, improvising, or creating an out of box experience. Data sharing of these technologies keeps increasing with time, with more innovations into Big Data & Data Analytics. A concern of sharing data is that most applications preserve users' data almost permanently to understand users better, their habits, their lifestyle choices, and social networks. To be precise, currently, many applications store data about a user's online activities, searches, device operations, services used, and interests. Users are essentially creating a digital identity leveraging these technologies and social media platforms are the most commonly known data collectors.
Does data privacy exist? Should you be worried?
We have reached a whole new level of sophistication with data analytics, where we can connect the dots to identify patterns. Even without the traditional notion, users are now concerned about the trade-off between privacy and innovation. While some organisations follow strict compliance rules and legal requirements to protect data privacy, users should always be conscious of how different companies use their data. Many organisations preserve, use, and analyse data based on their long-term motives, followed by compliance and the nature of applications. Therefore, user awareness is the key to ensure that users leverage services based on their knowledge of the privacy practices of organisations.
Countries and their privacy practices you should know:
Are UK-based data collectors more or less likely to misuse data than their American counterparts? Customers can get an idea of a company's data privacy policies based on the privacy laws in their country or continent. In Europe, there are data privacy directives for all businesses and industries with the human right to privacy in mind. General Data Protection Regulation compliance in Europe is a comprehensive set of security and privacy laws.
As such, one can generally be assured that UK-based businesses have proper data protection practices in place. Of course, the implication here is that all UK businesses follow all rules and whilst there is an argument against this presumption, a generalisation can be made that the majority of UK-based businesses act in good faith and want the best for their customers.
However, there's no central data privacy law in the US that applies to all industries or businesses. There are several laws in US states and federal laws that prevent false practices. For example, California Consumer Privacy Act (CCPA) is a law quite similar to GDPR. As for federal laws, there are laws to ensure the proper use of children's data and to prevent unfair or deceptive practices. Being vague and complexly applied, US companies may not follow data protection practices as stringently as their European counterparts.
Looking at the global picture, data privacy becomes bleaker. There are places in the world that have little or no data privacy protection laws in place at all. Parts of Africa, South America and Asia have zero regulation in force, leaving individuals and consumers exposed to what would be considered data privacy breaches in Europe and America.
Conclusion
The world is becoming ever more interconnected. There is little doubt that the Internet has accelerated the development of society. However, the enjoyment of advances in information sharing may have come with a price. That is, to enjoy the benefits that information sharing brings, one must accept that their information is part of the deal. However, that deal that is struck between individuals and organisations must be fair. Whilst not everyone lives in a country that enjoys the benefits of data privacy laws, every individual arguably has the ability to choose. To ensure organisations serve in the people's best interests, people must use their choice to select products and services that serve their best interests.