Damning report ruining my Sunday - Cambridge Analytica, Christopher Wylie, Facebook - will we ever know?
This whole thing is deeply troubling.
Data is a wonderful thing. It cures disease, it unlocks our past, it connects people, helps people fall in love, helps people grieve, solves puzzles, gives people life, it opens doors, it creates possibility. Best of all and what pins all these wonderful things together is innovation and progress in our lives, society and for the progress as humans and the world we live. Please don’t ever forget this.
Today Ive had my Sunday pretty much ruined as Im struggling with the Cambridge Analytica story. Im struggling with it on a personal level. Im struggling with it professionally. Im struggling with it ethically. And Im deeply disappointed in the whole thing. Im also embarrassed by a craft that in the main aims to do good but ain't looking so good today.
We may never know whats really happened here and as I read articles, twitter feeds, commentary, opinions, facts, un-facts and lies I get a feeling we are just scratching the surface of whats happened here and its implications for all of us, and not just America who have this time potentially been impacted by the outcome of this alleged data breach.
So many questions…..Did Facebook give the data away unlawfully? Did Facebook know about the breach? did Cambridge Analytica take it illegally, did they get it lawfully but use it unlawfully or even just unethically? Are Facebook in the wrong for allowing this to happen to data they collect? Did Cambridge Analytica cross a legal or moral line? Is Christopher Wylie lying? Is he doing this purely for personal gain? For revenge? Or genuine reasons? Is Cambridge Analytica covering their tracks? Do customers of facebook know or even care how their data is used? Is using personal data to target personalised and tailored messages wrong? At what point did Cambridge Analytica think, are we doing the right thing here?
Christopher Wylie - Whistleblower at the centre of this story.
Cambridge Analytica strongly deny any wrongdoing on their twitter account in a long series of tweets. They are proactively responding to accusations.
The many conflicting headlines:
Its too early to answer any of these questions and while everyone weighs in with they opinions (often posted as fact) I wonder if this is going to have irreparable damage to the trust we have in Facebook, the trust we have in marketing departments to keep the right side of the ethical line of how it uses data and the trust we have in analytics as a whole. This whole thing shines a very murky light on how organisations use data which totally screws the balance of trust between giver of data and provider of services and products.
Even though Ive struggling with these events, as a founder of a business that helps organisations identify and deliver value locked away in their data, I am even more determined than I was before . Determined to ensure that we work with organisations who have positive intentions with how they extract value from data. Determined to work with organisations who want to work with openness and transparency with how their data is being used. And determined to continue to build a business that lives by these principles.
Data is a wonderful thing. Lets keep it that way.
▶ CEO at datazuum | Data & AI Strategy | Target Operating Models Specialist | Value Creation | 📣 Speaker | 🎙 Host of The Data Strategy Show
6yGood article Jason. It is all deeply disturbing and puts our businesses at the forefront of data ethics. Like you building a business that does good with data is fundamental to both our causes and many others. I think there will be more that will eventually come out, in particular I'm waiting for the algorithms that have a huge amount of bias in them, and no one can really uncover the decisions that have been made by the algo. We are seeing that now and people are questioning data that is held by authorities and the uses of it. Let's keep up the good fight and make data a beautiful thing for all.
CEO & Founder of DataTick | AI, Data, and Analytics (AIDA) expert | Data Strategy and Analytics Author | Creator of the AIDA Consulting Subscription Product | Board Advisor | Chief Data Officer
6yWhen I read articles like this I am happy with the position the ICO have taken over the implementation of GDPR, and GRPR regulators itself. They give me faith that someone is doing the right thing in this area. The ICO is emerging as one of the better regulators in the UK and EU. Has more teeth than It’s comparable regulators in energy, financial services, and communications who have all appeared a little bit lame by comparison. I would be even happier if our countries, such as the USA adopted GDPR so that the largest information harvesters such as Facebook, Google, etc were kept in check. As things stand global firms can hide in one or other jurisdictions.