4.3.9 Personal data and the IoE
Volunteered data | Inferred data | Oserved data |
Volunteered data is created and explicitly shared by individuals, such as social network profiles. | Inferred data, such as a credit score, is based on analysis of volunteered or observed data. | Observed data is captured by recording the actions of individuals, such as location data when using cell phones. |
Organisations can collect all sorts of personal data; however, there is a legal and ethical struggle between access and privacy. Blocks of data are enhanced with metadata that includes information about where the data was created, who created it, and where it is going. In this way, data becomes property that can be exchanged. This change will allow personal information to be audited to enforce policies and laws when issues arise.
The definition of personal data, however, is evolving. What might be personal data to one person may not seem like personal data to another person. For example, a cancer patient and a healthy patient may have very different ideas on what medical information they want kept private.