China’s Social Credit System (SoCS) is still not a unified standard system used all over China as expected in 2020. What has been established is a policy framework that encompasses a large number of initiatives, both private and public and  … Read More

Nicole Broch Larsen is a professional golfer. She uses data to optimize her game, but there are downsides to datafying the the sport. Both in terms of human skills and the risk of abuse of sensitive personal data. The tools … Read More

Apple is taking another step towards giving users control over their data and obtain privacy. From this spring your iPhone’s IOS will force all apps to ask you to opt in, if you are okay with being tracked. The current … Read More

Three Norwegian municipalities are breaking the law in their use of Google Suit for Education (GSFE) and thus get a warning from the Data Protection Authority (DPA). It is very hard – if possible at all – to actually use … Read More

The Forum on Information and Democracy has published a report of on how to fix infodemics. Based on more than 100 contributions from international experts, it offers 250 recommendations on how to rein in a phenomenon that threatens democracies and … Read More

Analysis. Products and services, which try to embed privacy and work ethically responsible with data, are finally progressing. It is uphill to compete with monopoly tech’s convenient and dirt cheap or ‘free’ products, but more and more individuals seem to … Read More

The Chinese are coming. Beware! The Trump government is warning everybody against digital services like TikTok, because it is, he says, stealing American data. What he does not say is that he and American big tech are deeply worried about … Read More

The World Federation of Advertisers, WFA, has launched a guide to its members on how they can go the data ethics way. It comes at a time where doing the right thing is becoming more of a must have that … Read More

Over a 100 years ago, the US company Pullman produced railroad cars and wanted to place a factory 10 miles outside the city center. It built a city around the factory premises, where all the workers could live and thus … Read More

Is it okay to participate in the criticized ad tech system, when your service is dealing with such sensitive data as women’s fertility data? For the German-founded privacy-focused start-up Clue, it is a constant balance between being user-friendly and private … Read More

If we want to use personal data to help humans and societies thrive, we need to make de-anonymisation illegal and let independent third parties into machine rooms to audit anonymisation processes. As it is today, we get more and more … Read More

As with most other telcos, Telefonica is looking for new business models, as their old model is becoming extinguished. Privacy and security is one area, where the Spanish telco is investing and seeing new opportunities. For over a year, it … Read More

No way should we let machines and data take over from humans in health care. But we should let machines assist us in the hard work, where they are better than humans. The overriding question is; how much control and … Read More

If individuals control their own data, they control their own lives and neither government nor big companies can manipulate us economically or politically. There is a long way to go for that, but there is a growing movement around ‘my … Read More

Blog. When Apple blocked by default all third party cookies in its Safari-browser, Facebook and others made a circumvention and used a first party cookie to track us. Apple is back with an answer to that. The ad tech industry … Read More

Blog. The global AI race has been on for a while. It is about speedy automation, and China and the US are heading in a fierce competition, where human autonomy is secondary to economic growth. China operates as a ‘data … Read More

News. A new way of getting you to pay the optimal price – according to the seller – is to higher the price, the closer you get to a physical store, according to a story In Yahoo Finance. But this … Read More

Blog. Anything that can be predicted will be predicted. Such were the words in one of many  events in Davos during World Economic Forum 2019. Artificial intelligence, privacy and ethics and data for good use were among the hot topics … Read More

Blog. Report from the 40th International Conference of Data Protection and Privacy Commissioners. Big tech, capitalising big on other peoples’ data, were scolded. Others hit the roof talking about saving democracy and humanity. Facebook has at least 11 ways of … Read More

Blog. Google’s plan of building a neighborhood in Toronto is moving forward. Until recently, urban planning was done by public authorities where the public had a right to know what was going on. These days might be over. There is … Read More

Book Chapter. Profiling through cookies, IP addresses, apps, device fingerprinting and data brokers is getting more advanced, as are new technologies such as Artificial Intelligence, using microchips and sensors integrated into our homes, cars and cities. Everything we do online … Read More

Blog. Will you pay with money to read news, or are you okay with paying with your opinions? These are two options the Dutch start-up, the Playwall, offers media companies to obtain more users and income – and become less … Read More

Book. Regulation, competitive innovation, social responsibility, worker and consumer choice and education are the five magic bullets on how to solve the current digital trust crisis, according to an excellent book from Andrew Keen; ‘How To Fix the Future’. As … Read More

Report. The Ethics Advisory Group (EAG) to the European Data Protection Supervisor  (EDPS) has identified the most crucial digital ethics dilemmas confronting humans in the wake of new technology. The report ‘Towards A Digital Ethics’ describes how we in Europe … Read More

The Danish company Edulab has prepared a customer data promise as a set of data ethical guidelines and an understandable privacy policy, telling users what they do and don’t do with their data. A role model which most services targeted … Read More

Analysis. The big data challenge in 2018 in will be to maintain digital trust. In government,  in companies and in each other. In Europe, new groundbreaking privacy rules are in place that ensure the individual’s right to control his own … Read More

Blog. Most social media and apps know that they have many children on their services, but they refrain from any responsibility by requiring that you have to be 13 years in their terms which almost no one reads when signing … Read More

Daniel Kaplan is part of Fing.org and MesInfos.org and MyData.org and spoke at  European Data Ethics Forum about how to empower individuals with their own data and do meaningful things with their data. Knowledge is power, and of course we … Read More

News. The ‘transparent charging station’ makes visible the invisible logic using a algorithm-base display that shows how the electricity is allocated between the cars being charged. The idea from Holland fits well in the the MyData-Movement, as it is a … Read More

Blog. Some companies have begun to exploiting that individuals have become transparent due to constant tracking of our online behaviour. They feed us with offers and prices, which are more to their own advantage than their customers’. Tools for digital … Read More

Book. A new freely available German book looks at all angles of digitalization. Personalized medicine and pricing, AI and algorithms, digitalised education and fitness, open source, a monthly recap of what has happened in Germany in 2017 and a vox … Read More

News. Artificial Intelligence (AI) will change the role of the car and therefore we need to make sure that AI will share our values. Such was the message from the CEO of Audi Rupert Stadler at a UN conference AI … Read More

Report. The UK data protection office published a new well-written report on big data, artificial intelligence, machine learning and data protection. Especially 5 areas can have possible implications for data protection.  “It is not a case of big data ‘or’ … Read More

Analysis. Wire. Disconnect. Startpage. Protonmail. TomTom. HelloClue. These are all companies which can be categorized as part of a new and growing market for ‘Privacy Tech’ aimed at consumers. Data Gravity, Privacy Perfect, Privacy Cheq and One Trust are part … Read More

Not only the address is cool: Rosenthaler Str 40 in Berlin, 6th floor overlooking Hackesche Markt. The product is just as cool: At secure privacy-enhancing messaging and ‘skype’ app called WIRE – free and user-friendly. For Wire, privacy was a … Read More

Report. An EU opinion explores the concept of technologies and ecosystems aiming at empowering individuals to control the sharing of their personal data. The so-called personal data stores entail huge perspectives in supporting data protection principles, but they also face … Read More

The Japanese Government has decided to test and promote the relatively new concept called Personal Data Stores, where individuals get control over their own data as opposed to the current digital infrastructure with huge data monopolies controlling most personal data. … Read More

The ‘MyData Movement’ came off the ground this week in Helsinki. With the conference MyData2016 we are seeing the beginning of a paradigm shift, where corporate control of personal data will begin shifting to individual data control. ‘The Person is … Read More

Blog. Danish companies want to offer more personalized advertising. They are asking for a revision of a payment services act, which is fair enough, as it will ensure fair competition with global services who can use our credit card data … Read More

Blog. With some big data companies twisting and even abusing privacy terms, we need to be very careful in distinguishing the true privacy and data ethical companies and practices from those who are clearly ‘privacy washing’ or in a nicer … Read More

Blog. How will self-driving cars change transportation and our cities, who is to blame in an accident, are they creepy or not. The newspaper Information hosted an exciting event at Science Day, 25.04.2016. Below are selected highlights. Mette Møller, DTU: … Read More

Blog. Investors are pouring money into apps that allow women to track their fertility. This can be good for couples wanting to control when to get pregnant and for science. But there are huge privacy pitfalls here, as we are … Read More

Analysis. Before you buy a wearable to track your health, then check whether you can trust the company behind the gadget. Products for the quantified-self-segment are a lucrative business growing rapidly, because they really are motivating to use. But most … Read More

Research: Data collection and analytics have pervaded nearly every sphere of daily life, from commerce to health, from transport to education, to employment. But there is also a rise in intimate surveillance relating to love, romance, and sexual activity. There … Read More

Blog. CPDP2016 is over. The best conference in Europe on privacy and data ethics took place from Wednesday to Friday – 27th-29th – in Brussels. Below a few highlights, but most of the sessions will be shown here on Youtube … Read More

Analysis. Some public websites are starting to clean out the use of so-called third-party cookies – those who share personal information with others. Websites with advertising are more dependent on tracking cookies – also called small spies. Yet, many public … Read More

News: The Fourth Industrial Revolution has the potential to raise global income levels and improve the quality of life for populations around the world. But it could also yield greater inequality, particularly in its potential to disrupt labor markets. This … Read More

News: The new General Data Protection Regulation from the EU, which found a compromise late December, and is expected be finally agreed upon in January 2016, has some good and some bad news. Some of the good: Individuals have clear rights: for example you can demand … Read More

Event: One of the better privacy conferences is “Computers, Privacy and Data Protection” – CPDP  in January in Brussels every year. It all started with Caspar Bowden, formerly Microsoft, later a highly respected critical observer of data abuse and, unfortunately, … Read More

Hundreds of millions of users are already blocking ads and cookies today, but it is just be the tip of the iceberg, claims Frederic Filoux in his always great column Monday Note. “The ad blocking picture in even more startling … Read More