Three forces are currently driving change in the big data industry. These include:
- Consumer mistrust
Surveillance capitalism, an economic system built around the secret extraction and manipulation of people's data, has become common in this decade. It has led to mistrust, as consumers increasingly get concerned that their data is being bought, used and sold without their knowledge and consent. Companies like Facebook and Twitter are scrutinized by consumers and users who believe they hold and sell their data. This has reduced the daily number of active users on these platforms.
- Government action
The government is moving fast to reduce the influence that big tech wields. This has seen the rising number of legislations proposed and passed targeting privacy and regulating data markets to protect personal rights to privacy. For example, lawmakers are implementing laws similar to Europe's GDPR, while the EU has turned its attention to AI, another area that has attracted attention.
- Competition in the market
Competition in the big data and analytics field has been peaking for the past few years. Apple, for example, has upgraded its iPhone OS to allow users to shut down the ability of data harvesters to track them in different apps. This gives customers power over their data, meaning no one can track them without their consent. The upgrade means that using cross-app tracking is not easy to achieve. Companies that have been relying on cross-app tracking are making losses. Reports indicate that in the second half of 2021, they lost more than $10 billion in revenue.
The new privacy rules include the following:
- Focusing on trust over transactions
The first rule to privacy is consent. Companies are collecting vast customer data to understand their preferences, habits and identities. This is often done without the knowledge of the customers. With the shifting focus on customer consent, privacy regulations demand that no information about an individual is collected without their consent. Companies must cultivate a culture of trust with their customers.
- Insight instead of identity
As companies seek data, they need to consider how they acquire it from customers. Currently, firms transfer vast amounts of personally identifiable information (PII) through various web of data agreements consisting of privacy and security. However, with today's advances, it is possible to get insights from data without acquiring or transferring data from one place to another. The algorithms and data can structure the process of extracting data that meets the required standards. Therefore, the algorithms can gather statistics instead of moving data around various points. For example, Google Apps such as Swipe do not collect or move data from one point to another. Rather, they analyze it directly on users' smartphones.
- Flows over silos
Once all the customer data has been consented to and you are acquiring insights without transferring it, CIOs should ensure that there are no silos. Organizations should ensure that no data is locked up by facilitating the flow of insights to acquire maximum insight for the customer's benefit.
