Data for the People: How to Make Our Post-Privacy Economy Work for You

by Andreas Weigend

Overview

A long-time chief data scientist at Amazon shows how open data can make everyone, not just corporations, richer

Every time we Google something, Facebook someone, Uber somewhere, or even just turn on a light, we create data that businesses collect and use to make decisions about us. In many ways this has improved our lives, yet, we as individuals do not benefit from this wealth of data as much as we could. Moreover, whether it is a bank evaluating our credit worthiness, an insurance company determining our risk level, or a potential employer deciding whether we get a job, it is likely that this data will be used against us rather than for us.

In Data for the People, Andreas Weigend draws on his years as a consultant for commerce, education, healthcare, travel and finance companies to outline how Big Data can work better for all of us. As of today, how much we benefit from Big Data depends on how closely the interests of big companies align with our own. Too often, outdated standards of control and privacy force us into unfair contracts with data companies, but it doesn't have to be this way. Weigend makes a powerful argument that we need to take control of how our data is used to actually make it work for us. Only then can we the people get back more from Big Data than we give it.

Big Data is here to stay. Now is the time to find out how we can be empowered by it.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780465096534
Publisher:	Basic Books
Publication date:	01/31/2017
Sold by:	Hachette Digital, Inc.
Format:	eBook
Pages:	272
File size:	7 MB

About the Author

Andreas Weigend is one of the world's foremost experts on the future of big data, social-mobile technologies, and consumer behavior. He teaches at Stanford University, the University of California, Berkeley, and Cheung Kong Graduate School of Business in China. He is the founder and director of the Social Data Lab. He lives in San Francisco, California.

Table of Contents

Prologue: When Everything Is Recorded ix

Introduction: The Social Data Revolution 1

1 Becoming Data Literate: Essential Tools for the Digital Citizen 13

2 Character and Characteristics: The Stand-off Between Digital Privacy and Digital Honesty 39

3 Connections and Conversations: Identity and Reputation in the Social Graph 69

4 Context and Conditions: Making Sense of the Sensorization of Society 107

5 Seeing the Controls: Transparency for the People 145

6 Taking the Control(s): Agency for the People 175

7 Rights into Realities: Applying the Power of Transparency and Agency 199

Epilogue: Into the Sunlight 233

Acknowledgments 235

Notes 237

Index 281

Editorial Reviews

…an exhaustive and insightful look at how data is collected and used, often without our knowledge and almost always without our input…Weigend's book is meticulously researched…

The New York Times Book Review - Amy Webb

11/28/2016
Many readers are likely to be resistant to this book’s underlying premise—that “the time has come to recognize that privacy is nothing more than an illusion.” Weigend, the onetime chief scientist of Amazon, certainly delineates, in familiar ways, how the “Internet of things,” and the capacity to create, record, store and analyze data, can be beneficial. But some of his speculative future tools—such as creating “trust coefficients” that tie one’s reputation, in a measurable numeric way, to that of a friend—come across as frighteningly Orwellian, and he provides no emotionally intelligent examination of the toll on human interactions. That obliviousness is also evident when Weigend wonders why people could feel more threatened by the unobtrusive surveillance capacities of a tool such as Google Glass than by a smartphone that can make similar audio and video recordings. Weigend’s solution to concerns about the loss of privacy—that everyone gets new rights to “data transparency and agency”—comes across as both laudably idealistic and impractical. (Jan.)

Publishers Weekly

"An exhaustive and insightful look at how data is collected and uses... Weigend argues persuasively that in this 'post-privacy' world, we should give our data freely, but that we should expect certain protections in return."
—New York Times Book Review

"[Weigend] makes a strong case for what we need-the right to amend or blur the data that pertains to us, the freedom to experiment with it and take it with us to other sites and services, and the ability to insist that data refineries be clear about how they're using our information."
—Wall Street Journal


"A hugely interesting read, packed to bursting with intriguing examples... The depth and breadth of Weigend's experience is clear in the sheer range of technologies and business models he describes. He explains critical concepts clearly and concisely, at a pace that should keep both experts and those new to the field hooked."
—New Scientist

"Weigend is a bold explorer of the technological future. His compelling book maps the opportunities of a world without secrets."
—Daniel Kahneman, author of Thinking Fast and Slow


"Data for the People asks us to think seriously about the data we generate in our online world, and how we are increasingly losing control over it. These products and services that generate data are not going away. And with advances in artificial intelligence enabling computers to do traditionally human tasks in a scalable manner, this data can and will continue to be utilized across the majority of decisions by institutions. Andreas acknowledges and embraces this future, and provides a framework and a call to action to ensure that in this world, as consumers, we can use and control our data in ways that are both transparent and beneficial to us."
—Vinod Khosla, Partner at Khosla Venture

"The author maintains the intellectual complexity of his subject while remaining accessible to readers searching for the truth about the salability of their privacy, the nuances of data sharing, and the ways to cloak their digital footprints. A cautionary, cohesively delivered update on the scope and science of human quantification."
—Kirkus Reviews

"Data-abundant, ubiquitous, personal-is restructuring our competing values of privacy, convenience, identity, and control. No one understands this better than Weigend, and with Data For the People, he helps the rest of us understand it as well."
—Clay Shirky, author of Here Comes Everybody


"Andreas Weigend is the preeminent thinker on the economic power of social data. Data for the People is a brilliant guide for how individuals, companies and policymakers can tap data's value while retaining our
human values. Thought provoking-and action-inspiring!"
—Kenneth Cukier, Senior Editor, The Economist and coauthor of Big Data


"Data is the new oil-the key means of production in modern capitalism. Big data refineries such as Google, Amazon, Facebook, and OKCupid influence where we work, what we buy, who we marry, and how we vote-in ways that very few people understand, much less control. This is an excellent book about the biggest ever challenge to human privacy and autonomy. Social data expert Andreas Weigend explains the incredibly detailed data we give to these companies, how it's used to nudge our decisions, and how we can take back control so our data empower us rather than exploiting us."
—Geoffrey Miller, associate professor of psychology at the University of New Mexico

"Finally a highly readable and heartfelt book about data by a leading technologist! Andreas Weigend writes with superb clarity about the most important issue of the early 20th century-the data economy and its threat to our privacy and individual rights. The narrative of his own personal journey from East Germany to becoming the Chief Scientist at Amazon.com is also compelling. Overall a major work by one of the world's leading authorities on data."
—Andrew Keen, author of The Internet Is Not the Answer


"This book is a landmark in the debate on privacy and data sharing. Everyone whose data is being captured and mined-in other words, everyone-should heed Weigend's call for data literacy and support his 'Data Bill of Rights.'"
—Pedro Domingos, author of The Master Algorithm and professor of computer science at the University of Washington

From the Publisher

2016-11-23
How you can collect, use, and control your own data.Technology expert Weigend (co-editor: Time Series Prediction: Forecasting the Future and Understanding the Past, 1993) believes we are all immersed in a "social data revolution" that will benefit everyone better if it is monitored and managed by each of us. As social data is disseminated and gathered at increasingly exponential rates, having control over all aspects of that data sharing is key to a fair exchange. The author's research encompasses the risks and dangers of sharing personal information "because data can be used against us," as he personally attests to in an anecdote about his father, who was arrested and jailed for six years in 1949 based on accumulated data that led Soviet intelligence to assume he was an American spy. That ordeal forms the foundation for a fascinating discussion on the nature of data mining and how individual privacy is routinely and often unknowingly compromised. Weigend examines the innovative collection methods of corporations, the predictability of algorithms, and the "signals of interest" that consumers dispatch with each click. From facial recognition software to targeted advertising to legions of networked cameras monitoring our every move as a "default condition of life," these modern advances should spur individuals to re-evaluate their concepts and expectations of privacy. The legwork is up to us, writes the author—to first realize our inherent fears and reservations about data gathering and then investigate ways to stem the tide of personal information flowing in and out of the technological grid. Weigend offers a four-pronged strategy aimed at those who choose to limit their data sharing and achieve true transparency. The author maintains the intellectual complexity of his subject while remaining accessible to readers searching for the truth about the salability of their privacy, the nuances of data sharing, and the ways to cloak their digital footprints.A cautionary, cohesively delivered update on the scope and science of human quantification.

Kirkus Reviews