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< | It is strongly recommended that you include your outline in the body of your essay by using the outline as section titles. The headings below are there to remind you how section and subsection titles are formatted. | | | The Faustian Bargain | | | The idea of the exchange, bypassing third party data collectors, requires a lot of work on both building the consumer and advertiser part of the network. These companies are unlikely to gain fast traction. Another permutation on the theme are "Personal Data Lockers". This is a central account where people store information about themselves, accessible across devices. Using such a service is a large privacy risk and it remains to be seen whether (1) the security technology can be respectable, and (2) the incentives of the companies to meaningfully protect customers are there. One example is Personal, a young company that wants to store our financial, education, and health records -- in addition to all of our passwords. In exchange, the company builds a layer of security and privacy to be controlled by the user. Alignment of interest is closer than with that of Facebook. Still, the risk is obvious. A free software version of the same is called the Locker Project and is under active development. Once the data is collected in one place, we are a quick hop away from paying people to share it. | |
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< | A number of other companies have explored related approaches. These serve as warnings of what will continue to happen to personal data if it is not protected by a robust technology layer. A young company called Singly, has developed an API for other apps that pulls personal information from 18+ networks with social graphs (e.g., Facebook, Instagram). Access to the API is sold in a SAAS model and is free under 100 users. As a result, any developer can within hours launch an application that aggregates personal data, with some level of required user authentication, across social networks. The barrier to entry is gone. And although there are no meaningful consumer-advertiser exchanges yet, Exelate and BlueKai do run advertiser-merchant exchanges that show the scale at which our data is commoditized. Each has millions upon millions of accounts of rich data, collected via cookies, bought en masse, and anonymized. | >
> | But if in addition to
controlling the data we are storing it ourselves, and if "sale"
occurs in a system of accountability for expiration, so that the
availability of the personal data can be temporary as well as
situationally limited by use-commitments, we would be closer to
what we want than a survey of what people hoping to make money off
us are presently thinking about hoping we might accept. We do have
to start somewhere, but why not—instead of surveying
websites—discuss what the best place to start must be. "What
I am talking about is a bunch of self-serving nonsense but we have
to start somewhere" is not a particularly attractive bunch of data.
A number of other companies have explored related approaches. These serve as warnings of what will continue to happen to personal data if it is not protected by a robust technology layer.
This, which could be rephrased as above "What I am talking about is noxious but it helps to remind us what we should do something about," isn't a much more attractive coming-attractions sign for some websites you dug up.
A young company called Singly, has developed an API for other apps that pulls personal information from 18+ networks with social graphs (e.g., Facebook, Instagram). Access to the API is sold in a SAAS model and is free under 100 users. As a result, any developer can within hours launch an application that aggregates personal data, with some level of required user authentication, across social networks. The barrier to entry is gone. And although there are no meaningful consumer-advertiser exchanges yet, Exelate and BlueKai do run advertiser-merchant exchanges that show the scale at which our data is commoditized. Each has millions upon millions of accounts of rich data, collected via cookies, bought en masse, and anonymized. | | | A Penny For Your Thoughts | | | The silver lining is that perhaps the data exchange companies will bring awareness to the public at large about how web-services make their money. As a second step, people will compare the value offered against the risks involved, and make an informed opinion against selling their information. | |
>
> | So we can do everything
wrong but at least maybe then we will learn what we should be doing
instead, and perhaps the web services I've just been advertising
might pay me something for driving some eyeballs in their direction?
I think the motto of the revision should be "Dare to be Great,
Joanie Caucus." Instead of telling us about a good deal of
presently-existing snake oil, tell us what should actually be done,
to contribute to solving problems, instead of being better warned
about them, or better able to understand the problem after we've
made it worse, or some other sophisticated reason for not actually
being about solving it.
| | | Other Sources
http://www.dailydot.com/news/enliken-sell-personal-information-data-advertisers |
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