Big Data Ethics

Throughout this course we have all seen some amazing visualizations and great insights using big data. Big data has been around for a long time but data is now able to be stored in unprecedented amounts, especially personal data. Many of the visualizations using twitter data that we have seen has been very useful and interesting but what is in place to make sure these studies respect privacy? There is currently very weak regulations for collecting consumer data and privacy settings on web browsers are not legally binding. Regulation of data collection and use is a "Big Data" problem within itself. Many people are afraid that along with these insights using personal data could come profiling and discrimination. Last year the European Union came out with the Data Protection Directive. This directive has a very broad scope in protecting personally identifiable data and holding controllers responsible. The United States does not have anything that compares to this. So where do we look from here? Be conscious of what you do with your personal data and use good judgement when attempting to gain insight on any data that could be related back to individuals. I added some links below that touch on privacy regarding big data.

<http://searchcloudapplications.techtarget.com/feature/Big-data-collection-efforts-spark-an-information-ethics-debate>

<http://www.stanfordlawreview.org/online/privacy-paradox/big-data>