Big data

The phrase “big data” tends to conjure a picture of the NSA hacking into your email, or Google tracking your every movement on the Internet. But big data can also help in the fight against poverty. By examining the trends provided to us through unstructured online data, we can begin to form a story about those people whom have previously remained “off-the-grid”, or, in the financial world, “unbanked.” For example, it’s hard to get a loan when you don’t have any credit history. But what if financial institutions could use big data to tell the story about those “thin-file” type clients that a traditional credit check could not? Startups like DemystData, for instance, are doing just that.

These trends, along with the startups and markets driving them, aren’t miracle cures for poverty by any means — but what they can do is broaden access, to make the web work for people who have been left out of the system for decades. At Accion, that’s what we believe financial inclusion is all about — handing people the tools they need to improve their lives around the world. For us #EndPoverty is a call to action — and we are harnessing the power of the Internet as yet another way to get there.

- Sydney Moyer, Communications Associate at Accion

Sign up for Accion’s newsletter to learn more about technology and financial inclusion.