This article is a continuation of Part 1 where we covered the contents in the report “Global data privacy: What the consumer really thinks”, published by DMA UK. In this article, let us examine the concerns and apprehensions of consumers over the current data sharing model. The study has identified several ‘hygiene factors’ that consumers look for in choosing the organizations that they are willing to share their data to. These factors, which can be summarised in terms of control, trust and transparency are imperative in order to protect user privacy and build a fair and equitable data ecosystem.

Consumer Trust is the most important factor and is a requisite for encouraging consent towards data sharing

Source: “GLOBAL DATA PRIVACY: WHAT THE CONSUMER REALLY THINKS”, Pg16

As seen in the survey results shown above, trust is the highest ranked factor in influencing people’s decision to share personal data. Trust is arguably a tricky factor as there is no tangible way to quantify and verify it. As it is largely built through a company’s product and marketing strategy, people’s brand preference may easily influence their perceived trust rating of an organization, although it does not necessarily mean they took specific steps in protecting user data privacy.

An organization can also clearly state in their EULA (End User License Agreement) or Terms of Service their dedication towards user privacy, but still be the subjected to data breaches or find legal loopholes where personal data continues to be misused. It isn’t far-fetched to assert that trust is far from an ideal solution due to its vulnerability to human fallibility, and a system that truly protects the privacy rights of the consumer needs to give control and ownership back to the user themselves, which brings to the next point…

An overwhelming majority would like more control and transparency with regards to data usage and collection

Source: “GLOBAL DATA PRIVACY: WHAT THE CONSUMER REALLY THINKS”, Pg15

As shown above, there is a majority that indicated a desire for more control, especially to prevent their personal data from being sold to third parties. Currently, companies that collect personal data are usually required by law to give permission to users to reject the sharing and collection of their personal data. However, the steps to enact such settings could be unnecessarily complicated which indirectly limits the user’s freedom of choice. For example, up until the Cambridge Analytica scandal and the roll-out of GDPR regulations, changing privacy settings for your Facebook account is complicated and difficult to access.

Even now, flexibility in terms of control is limited and rather binary, as you are unable to specifically choose the types of data that you would like to share (Eg. You are comfortable with sharing your interest and behavioral data, but do not want to share your location and demographic data).

Source: “GLOBAL DATA PRIVACY: WHAT THE CONSUMER REALLY THINKS”, Pg17

Consumers strongly articulated the need for transparency across the product and data sharing policy. Unfortunately, since data is largely handled by private corporations, there is no sure way to fully comprehend the organization’s data collection and sharing policies. We are only able to take the company/organization’s word for it, which once again raises a trust problem that should be ideally avoided.

SWIPE as a data sharing and privacy protocol

SWIPE is more than just a data marketplace; it is an apparatus that reforms the way data is collected, shared, and traded. Under SWIPE, open-source code in the form of smart contracts set rules for data governance and handles ownership, access rights, privacy control and monetization policy. There is no need to take any organization by their word, who are at risk of either betraying the user’s trust or the target of a data breach themselves. One of the wonders of smart contracts is that if the code is open-source, there is little room for fraud as you can independently verify that the action executed is legitimate and lawful.

Under the SWIPE network, data providers (app developers and users) are able to control the access and sharing policy for the data-sets. All user data collected is encrypted using their own keypass and stored on IPFS. Data buyers would initiate a data campaign, detailing specifications such as the datasets required and reward distribution. Using proxy re-encryption, SWIPE’s Analytics Engine would gain access to the datasets, aggregate and anonymize them as per campaign requirements and finally transfer it to the buyer.

For those that recall, Cambridge Analytica managed to gain access and collected personal data on 87M Facebook users through a single app that surveyed a few hundred thousand people, but due to Facebook’s design also allowed access to the data of their entire network of friends. SWIPE’s network is able to prevent such incidents from happening as data is encrypted and owned by the providers, the users themselves.

This report has clearly established the mood and attitude of the users — the linchpin of the data ecosystem that it cannot function without. Data legislation in the form of GDPR has been a great leap forward in the protection of privacy rights without significantly compromising the needs of corporations. The next great leap forward would be a reform of the distribution mechanism such that users will be fairly compensated and rewarded. That is what SWIPE is here for.

About SWIPE

SWIPE aims to create a network of apps that are able to work together to create valuable data as a collective, instead of relying on centralized intermediaries. As part of the network, all data collected will be aggregated, anonymized and encrypted. It will then be channeled into an analytics engine which packages it to be monetized directly to data buyers in a decentralized data marketplace. This process provides transparency to data buyers as they can trace the origins of the data, creates a fairer way for app developers to monetize data and empowers users by giving them full control and ownership of their data. SWIPE is invested by Kenetic, a blockchain firm that invested in huge blockchain projects like Zilliqa, ICON, and Bluzelle.

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