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.

A regulation for data mining business

-- By MaikoHayakawa - 09 Oct 2020

1. Overview

I believe taxing data mining behaviors and spending tax revenue to help people learn about their choices of communication in the Internet society could be a way to regulate data mining business. In this essay, I discuss why data miners should be regulated, and what the problem of current consent-based regulations is, in order to identify what the necessary aspects of a possible regulation are. Then, after exploring a hint from environmental regulation, I propose an idea of taxing data miners as a way that has the necessary aspects.

2. The necessity of regulations

Regulations are needed because data miners prevent people from thinking freely. Data mined by data miners is used to create people’s next behavior and make them obsessed. People are psychologically controlled and they are prevented from thinking freely. In order to protect people’s freedom to decide what to do next by themselves, something has to be done.

3. The problem of current regulations

3.1. Current regulations

The basic idea of current regulations for data mining in many jurisdictions is to require miners to get consent from data owners.

3.2. Problem of the current regulations

3.2.1. From the perspective of a person who is asked to give consent to data mining

If people understand there are other options they can take to achieve their goals, they have freedom to choose whether they consent or not. However, if they believe there is no other choice than giving consent, consent does not protect them from being deprived of their freedom. For example, if a person who wants to communicate by email does not know how to use email without services such as Gmail, the person does not have a choice not to give consent to data mining.

3.2.2. From the perspective of others

The problem is not an individual one, because someone’s behavior affects others. People whose data is mined and who are obsessed can make others obsessed and lose freedom to decide what to do next through their behaviors. Consent-based regulations neglect this influence.

4. Necessary aspects of a possible regulation

4.1. Being enable people to choose other options

In order to get back the freedom to decide what to behave, it is necessary for people to understand there are other options to communicate in the Internet society and have the ability to choose them.

In order for people to do so, making sure that people have access to necessary tools and education is essential. During the pandemic, there was news that showed a photo in which some students who could not afford Internet connection did their homework at Taco Bell's parking lot to use its free wifi. https://www.wsws.org/en/articles/2020/09/02/elem-s02.html They did not have necessary tools and education, so they did not have options not to be data-mined through free wifi.

4.2. Addressing the problem of the effect that caused by others’ behavior

A regulation must not neglect the fact that people’s obsessed behaviors deprive others of freedom to decide their own behaviors.

4.3. Not a centralized control

4.3.1. One suggested idea : making platforms public utilities

One of the readings suggested to regulate Facebook and Google as public utilities. https://www.brookings.edu/wp-content/uploads/2020/08/FP_20200908_facebook_google_algorithm_simons_ghosh.pdf

I understand it is one way to prevent certain private powers from manipulating people's behavior. However, as long as there is a centralized control, there would be possibility that the controller (the government in this case) will centralize and utilize the power of data mining.

Therefore, we need to find the way in which people can have their power to control.

5. Analogy with environmental problems

The problem of data mining is similar to the environmental problems in a sense that behaviors cause harm to not only a direct victim but also others.

One of the ways to deal with environmental problems is to tax the companies. By taxing the behavior that causes environmental pollution and using the tax revenue to address environmental problems, environmental taxation can not only encourage companies to deter careless behaviors, but also collect money from them to take necessary measures to protect environment.

6. A possible idea : taxing

Learning from environmental taxation, I believe taxing data mining behaviors and spending tax revenue to help people learn could be a possible way to help people gain the control of their freedom.

First of all, It can help people to understand that there are other options and choose the options they like. Tax revenue can be used to provide people with necessary tools and education. When people learn that there are various options they can afford and handle, they can autonomically choose their ways.

Second, unlike consent-based regulations, this measure doesn’t neglect the influence among people. If people learn other choices and how to take them, they can protect themselves not only from direct control caused by data miners, but also from distraction caused through other individuals.

Third, by providing people with access to tools and education, this measure can help people to regain control and build an autonomous community, instead of giving a central controller the possibility to utilize their power. However, how to allocate tax will need to be done carefully, because if the tools and education are not provided in a proper way (for example, if education is provided in a biased way by the government), it would not help people to choose options autonomically but could help the centralized controller to utilize their power. Tax revenue should be used to give people a chance to educate each other, rather than letting government to educate what it wants.

7. Conclusion

In conclusion, I believe taxation can be a measure to protect freedom from data mining, through providing people with tools and environment which encourage them to educate each other. The way to make sure that tax revenue would be allocated properly needs further consideration.

This is a good start: you survey the ground and show where you want to focus. But you don't need most of the survey in order to bring the reader to your point; in fact, the sketch lines detract from your ability to focus the reader's attention. So the best route to improvement is to restrict the generalities to a second paragraph, leading with the idea on which you want to focus and returning to it as soon as you've shown briefly how you came by it.

Once that focus is in place, the need to strengthen the central argument will become more visible. Taxation merely raises a revenue, and while you gesture at how to use that revenue ("educate people") there's no actual specificity.

Nor do we understand why the source of the funds is more important than the operation of the remedy. No one actually cares whether clean drinking water is paid for by a tax on water polluters. I know of no State, no matter how parsimonious or how devoted to privatization, that believes in paying for all environmental action through special-source revenue. Once we have decided that clean air, clean water, regulation of occupational safety and health are valuable public goods, we can and do pay for them out of the general revenues. If there is a reason why this is not true of regulations of "data mining," a category you do not define, you have not shown it. These are the most valuable sources of improvement from this to the next draft.

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