Big Data transparency and the Data Sharing Economy

By , 20 March 2014 at 18:09
Big Data transparency and the Data Sharing Economy
Business

Big Data transparency and the Data Sharing Economy

By , 20 March 2014 at 18:09

By Jose Luis AgĆŗndez (@CiberJos), Big Data Innovation Program

20 March 2014: In the current context of economic downturn, the promise of Big Data to fuel growth by creating newĀ value out of existing data is still to be realized. This is despite efforts to foster it with new regulatoryĀ frameworks by policy makers, such as EU Commissioner Neelie Kroes, as described in her talk aroundĀ ā€œThe Economic and social benefits of big dataā€.

One course of action for Big Data to gain traction is proposed by Alex ā€œSandyā€ Pentland, MIT HumanĀ Dynamics Lab director, and world-class thought leader in Big Data and Personal Data (watch him in a video at the end of this piece and here). He defends theĀ need to build trust and transparency mechanisms around personal data, which guarantee that peopleā€™sĀ privacy preferences are respected. In a context of higher trust, companies would be allowed to findĀ insights in the data, creating value propositions that have personal, ā€œsocial goodā€ and businessĀ applications, while being transparent on the use of data.

With the growth of big data, its governance should be reliable, scalable, and efficient

Quoting Mr. Pentland during his talk on Digital Confidence at Telefonica Digital (found here) he describesĀ it as follows: ā€œWe need a framework where people know what they are getting into, can control it, and youĀ can audit it to know that it is safe and the right thing has been doneā€. He then explains that there willĀ always be risks as well as rewards, and it is a personal choice to find the right balance between opt-inĀ and anonymity. In order to explore openly this space, Telefonica Digital organized last year a DigitalĀ Confidence discussion panel with top names such as Ronan Dunne, CEO at Telefonica UK, ChristopherĀ Graham, UK Information Commissioner, together with Sandy Pentland and several panelists.

Regarding value creation vs privacy, Sandy states: ā€œPrivacy is the wrong debate. Privacy is oneĀ type of service that you could want, but what you really want is value for your data, and your want it to beĀ safe, secure, and under your controlā€. Telefonica Digital has explored the value creation angle withĀ products such as SmartSteps for Retail and Transport which was launched in the UK last year, but alsoĀ with the ā€œDatathon for Social goodā€, where insights extracted from mobile location data and Londonā€™sĀ ā€œopen dataā€ (i.e.: road incidents) provided by the UK Open Data Institute, were combined on new valueĀ propositions, as a living experiment towards a ā€œData Sharing Economyā€.

Recent industry analysis might help understand additional causes for the cautious pace at which data isĀ shared by companies. It turns out that 44% of companies don’t have formal Data GovernanceĀ policies. This is one of the key findings of the newly released ā€œ2013 Data Governance Surveyā€ conductedĀ by Rand Secure. The report concludes with some recommendations very relevant to Big Data, to setĀ companies in the right path to allow a better management and e-discovery of their data, to enableĀ extracting new value out of it:

  • Organizations should develop a formal data governance policy: “This survey shows thatĀ continually working to improve your policy can only increase the value your organizationĀ derives from its data.”
  • Consider new technologies to help reach your Data management goals: With the growth of bigĀ data, its governance should be reliable, scalable, and efficient.

At this point, the question is how to articulate solutions to the problems identified: on the one hand, how toĀ create a framework of transparency and trust around Big Data and Personal Data, and on the other hand,Ā how to help companies raise awareness on management and e-discovery of their data assets so thatĀ brand new value propositions can be built.

As ofĀ today, there is no full solution to the trust problem, although some efforts seem to be pointing inĀ the right direction. Initiatives like O2 UK Digital Confidence have led Telefonica innovation teams toĀ explore a ā€œData Lockerā€ concept in which a personal data dashboard allows users to visualize its ownĀ data (eg. the real social network of those you talk and text with), but also have opt-in choices to share bitsĀ in exchange for new views of aggregated data from all opted-in users, or access new services andĀ rebates exclusive for top data-sharers.

A team of researchers at Barcelona UPC University are exploring with Telefonica researchers anĀ interesting concept called ā€œObjects as a Serviceā€, which would encapsulate data, for instance PersonalĀ Data, in a form of ā€œdigital enclosureā€ comprising the data locked together with its access control rules andĀ ways to handle it, or functions, in a way that it cannot be read or modified if the reader does not have theĀ right permissions. It is still early research now, but it might help solve part of the problem. OtherĀ technology that focuses on preserving data, not as research but commercial grade, is Guardtimeā€™s KSIĀ which creates a ā€œcryptographic watermarkā€ to verify the integrity, time and origin of the data. With this, anyĀ attempt at modifying data would be detected in real-time.

Regarding governance of data, security is a key topic, especially in light of recent security scandalsĀ around theft of credit card data (e.g. Target). This is so severe that security experts point out thatĀ companies should ā€œassume that cyber criminals are already inside the network and should be stoppedĀ from accessing the most important parts ā€“ for example, customer data and intellectual propertyā€. To thatĀ end, Juniper Networks now offer an ā€œintrusion deceptionā€ technology to trick attackers into fake data, alsoĀ known as a honey-pot.

Another key aspect of Data governance is to enable a ā€œData Sharing Economyā€, so that once a trustĀ and transparency framework is in place, the data assets of a company can be shared in the dataĀ marketplace to finally monetize them. This is best exemplified by the growth of Millennial Media ExchangeĀ and similar marketplaces where offer meets demand, in a similar way to how the financial stock marketsĀ work.

So future Big Data Governance solutions would have to string it all together: a powerful dashboard forĀ personal data allowing transparent opt-in choices (like Telefonicaā€™s concepts on a ā€œData Lockerā€),Ā encapsulation of data for additional security (like ā€œObjects as a Serviceā€ would do if it were a commercialĀ product), honey-pots for cyber criminals (like Juniperā€™s) and if thieves get past those, means to detect andĀ trace any alteration of the data (like KSI would do), and finally a Data Marketplace to foster trading of dataĀ and insights (like MMX).

It might take some time and a few success stories, but if a trust environment is offered to people providingĀ full transparency and control of the way their personal data is used, and companies mature their DataĀ Governance policies, the ā€œData Sharing Economyā€œ will grow beyond the existing Open Data boundariesĀ and realize an Economic growth that could be similar to what the Industrial Revolution meant in centuriesĀ past.

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9xb6XAZSQ3I[/youtube]

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