by Angela Guess
Ryan Garner recently opined in Quartz, “Let’s just say it: In the future, successful data companies will not own any data. The data economy is the engine of growth for all digital businesses. However, the landscape is changing. We are heading for a data crunch. Data has huge economic value but it is becoming businesses’ biggest liability. As a consequence, in the future, data companies will not own data. They will just manage flows of it. Now that we are approaching three years since the Edward Snowden revelations, citizens are more conscious of their personal data. This is true not just from a government surveillance perspective, but also when it comes to corporate surveillance. Recent research shows that 97% of consumers in the UK, US, Germany, India and China are concerned that businesses or governments will misuse their data.”
Garner continues, “Trust is becoming an important currency in the business world. It’s not just trust in an organization to deliver quality products and services; it’s the trust that customers place in an organization to responsibly handle sensitive information. Another international study shows that 75% of consumers distrust brands with their personal data. This distrust and sense of anxiety about how personal data is being handled is affecting how people behave. The latest data from mid-2015 shows that 198 million ad-blockers were installed worldwide. This is costing businesses $22 billion per year. Even users of Facebook are taking radical steps to protect their personal identity, as it was recently reported that a million people access Facebook on the ‘dark web’ every month.”
Photo credit: Flickr/ Jurgen Appelo