Personal data could become a commodity

[DaBees-Knees]

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/technology-11571513

Companies that want to make use of the personal information people put online should pay for it, the US Consumer Electronics Association (CEA) has said. It made the statement as it released a list of five technology trends to watch for the year ahead.

Privacy was top of the list, which also included mobile and green technology.

"The mining of personal data is here to stay; there is just too much money at stake to imagine otherwise," said Sean Murphy, of the organisation. "Privacy is only going to continue to get increased attention in the years and months to come," said Mr Murphy who authored the report Selling The Stories Or Our Lives: Technology and Privacy.

Privacy has become a hot topic for net firms with a series of high-profile incidents over the last 12 months. The latest high profile glitch involved the leaking of data from some of the most popular applications on Facebook.

The Wall Street Journal claimed apps sent details to dozens of advertisers and companies that track what people are doing online.

Facebook said that it would introduce new technology to limit the security breach.

Mr Murphy said that there were companies which wanted to give users control of their data and allow those people willing to give their information away a chance to make money from it. "I haven't seen a successful business model yet but I reckon in the next year we will see people doing the behind the scenes work and aggregating this dossier of yourself and giving you something in exchange for it. "Companies will embrace it because it becomes more of a transaction where the consumer is authorising the use of their information and carrying out a business deal," added Mr Murphy.

'Economic opportunity'

The report highlighted one start-up firm in favour of this approach. Bynamite launched software earlier this year to let users find out which sites are tracking them online. "There should be an economic opportunity on the consumer side," Ginsu Yoon, co-founder of the firm said in the report. "In a few years...a person's profile of interests could be the basis for micropayments or discounts."

Consumer Watchdog, an advocacy group, said it had no trouble with such a scheme as long as users are fully aware of what they are doing. "That is the key to the whole thing," the group's John Simpson told BBC News.

"If people are fully informed, have control of their data and choose to opt in to some sort of scheme that offers payments for sharing information or price reductions, then I think that is fine. "The problem is that right now so much of this is done in the dark with online companies effectively looking over your shoulder while you are online and have no idea your information is being shared."

The CEA's Mr Murphy has also suggested government action is needed in the form of a major public awareness campaign to help users become better informed because so many are largely unaware of what they willingly share online and how the information can be used. A poll by CEA showed that identity theft was the number one concern among respondents followed by the security of financial transactions and personal health records.

I wonder what my private data is worth? One thing is for sure, it's certainly more than they are prepared to pay.  

[White Stripes]

....anyone seen the movie 'minority report' recently? ... those hologram billboards that called the ppl by name were horribly annoying from this side of the screen... i could only imagine the annoyances, headaches, data breaches, theft, etc from this type of ... uh.... 'commerce'... in real life...