In today’s digital age, our personal data is a prized asset that is constantly traded online without our knowledge. Every search we make, site we visit, like we post and song we download leaves a digital trail behind that reveals a lot about us – from our likes and dislikes to our religious and political beliefs, sexual orientation, medical conditions, and income. This is valuable information that people are willing to pay big money for.
According to a report by the cloud software firm Domo, every 60 seconds, Facebook users like four million posts, streamers watch 43 years’ worth of content, and Airbnb guests book 747 stays. All told, a single internet user produces, on average, 146,880MB of data per day. While legitimate businesses use anonymised data to create targeted ads and improve the browsing experience, some unscrupulous operators bypass legal routes to buy personal data from data brokers.
Data brokers are companies or individuals who harvest, analyse and trade personal data, selling it to third parties without our consent. This leaves users exposed to privacy and security concerns, including cold calls, scams, spam, cyber-attacks and identity theft. Our personal data can be accessed by advertisers, recruiters, employers, insurance companies, banks, credit providers, governments, and crooks. No wonder they call it ‘the oil of the digital economy’.
It is important to consider the texture of data, both the quantity of data and the quality of the overall volume of data, says Dr Steven Hai, assistant professor at Xi’an Jiaotong-Liverpool University. He believes that simply browsing the BBC website might generate a large volume of data, but using unauthorised or unregulated AI-generated content platforms to share sensitive information can lead to significant issues including data leaks, information pollution, and misinformation diffusion. While the rise of AI presents new risks, AI makes data security even more critical as it increases the sources of risk.
Legislation such as the EU and UK’s General Data Protection Regulation governs how our data can be used, processed and stored, with hefty fines issued to companies that do not comply. Other governments have adopted similar measures; however, levels of protection vary from country to country, and in some countries, there is still no legislation in place. While legislation is important because it protects consumer rights, human rights, and civil liberties, it is also hard to enforce as data flies across international borders.
There are simple things we can all do to protect ourselves. We can limit public access to our information, lower our risk of identity theft and keep our data from being sold by sharing only essential information online. Reputable antivirus software is also a must, as is regular housekeeping, removing information from Google search results, removing old accounts and deleting history from platforms such as Facebook and YouTube. A service like Incogni also makes it easier, submitting opt-out requests to data brokers and search sites, to demand they remove unauthorised personal information from their databases
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