Breakthroughs in AI and innovations in applying blockchain for personal data control and monetization enable new ways to make money off of personal information that most people currently give away for free.

Here we highlight three data science and business model innovations, starting with breakthrough ML technology that learns on the fly.

This AI Bloodhound can hunt

There’s an emergent machine learning technology out there that offers a clever new way of finding and classifying unstructured content.

In geek-speak, the technology is a vertical, personalized search engine that doesn’t require expensive knowledge graphs.

In human speak, it’s a context-sensitive, human-in-the-loop search engine that uses search criteria and implicit user feedback to recommend high-quality results.

And in talk to me as you might a young child, or a golden retriever speak, it’s like an AI Bloodhound in that it is instantaneously trained by the “scent” of content to go find, score, and bring back content that has an implicitly similar “scent.”

In user experience speak, it’s like this:

• Start a search session by using examples of what you’re looking for
• Choose results you like to tell your personalized AI to “go find more results like this”
• And alert me when you find me something good (if you’re out and about)

Unlike other ML applications, which need to be trained using high-quality content that can take weeks or months – this AI learns on the fly. Also, unlike other ML models, which are monolithic and have a reputation for being expensive and including things like “AI bias,” with this AI, pristine engines are instanted at each user’s search session level. There isn’t one ML engine – there are as many as you need. And because the ML engines are pristine when instantiated, there is no AI Bias. Instead, it’s the human-in-the-loop that introduces the “bias” when the human gives the personalized ML engine examples of the types of results it should be finding and bringing back.

One of the areas where this AI is being used is hiring and recruiting, within the context of a unique personal data monetization community.

Hey fam, the FAAAM oligarchs won’t be too happy about this

There’s an emergent community platform model in which members are given the ability to provide their personal information, configure its availability to others in the community, and then choose how to monetize it.

Members own all their data and determine which community actors benefit from it (unlike the tech giants who take your data, do who-knows-what with it while making money hand over fist, and then pay you little to nothing for it). 

Everything is stored securely thanks to blockchain technology, and only users (not the platform administrators) have the key to access it.

Opportunities are created for users to share their information with companies and other community members interested in purchasing it while also keeping that information safe and secure. AI expedites monetization by optimizing the matching of sellers and buyers.

An AI-powered staffing service that pays candidates to interview

One category of personal information that community members can choose to monetize is their resume. This is done via a Staffing Service “module” within the community and is powered by that AI Bloodhound technology.  Both sides of the supply-demand equation experience value:

The user experience (UX) for Staffing Company users or enterprise HR users:

1. Create a new job or requisition and configure the usual fields like role name, description, key requirements, and so on.
2. Drag and drop examples of resumes that the client or staffing company believes would be great for the role. Think of it as giving the AI resumes the likes of which the recruiter would hope to see from candidates.
3. Click the Save button.

That req is now its own AI-powered search session. When it runs a search, its results will include candidates whose resumes were implicitly similar to those used in step #2 above. The AI Bloodhound technology found resumes with the same “scent” as those it was trained on.

As recruiters review the search results, they select those resumes that they feel the AI got right. “These are the types of candidates I was hoping to find!”. With those results selected, they click the Search button again. The AI engine powering that specific requisition becomes instantly re-trained using the resumes that the recruiter just selected (positive model reinforcement). After only a couple of these cycles, the AI search results will reliably show candidates whose resumes were given a high AI score because they were implicitly and contextually similar to what the recruiter explicitly told the engine they were interested in.

It’s important to note that high-quality search results that the recruiters see don’t include candidates’ names or contact information at first. You’ll see why in a moment.

The UX for community members looking for jobs:

1. When candidates configure their resume settings, they set the dollar amount they want to be paid to reveal their contact information and take an interview with a recruiter.
2. After a candidate’s resume is uploaded or set as Active, it is analyzed and scored by all of the AI engines powering all of the jobs/requisitions created by the Staffing Companies.
3. A candidate’s resume will be given high AI scores by those requisitions whose AI engines were trained by example resumes implicitly similar to the candidate’s
4. A candidate is notified when there’s a position for which they’re a good fit, and the recruiter has agreed to pay the fee configured in #1.
5. The candidate then coordinates with the recruiter to discuss the opportunity.

Winner winner, chicken dinner

The hiring manager wins because the AI found the type of candidate they were looking for. They are happy to pay the candidate’s fee to avoid the time and frustrations involved with a keyword search.

The candidate wins twice: 1) They found a job opportunity that seems to be an excellent fit for them, and 2) They got paid while doing so.

And of course, everybody wins as more people are employed in jobs that are a good fit for them. Better quality of work. Less turnover. This can only help with getting the economy on a path for returning to pre-Covid levels.

Peer-to-peer digital marketplace for personal information: a sharing economy to dwarf all others?

Companies like Uber and Airbnb showed the world the power of “Sharing Economies” and the value that can be unleashed when you take an otherwise idle asset and make it available for utilization.

This data control and monetization community is like a sharing economy, except instead of putting physical assets into play, it puts members’ personal data and intellectual capital into play.

There are many more people on the planet than there are cars, homes and apartments, private rooms, and other properties. Every person has personal information. Therefore everyone stands to benefit.

Except, of course, companies with business models that depend on people giving them their personal information for free.

Co-author:

As a serial entrepreneur, Erik has started a number of companies as the main inventor and technologist. Being a veteran of the tech industry, his passion for innovation and belief in the power of creativity has led to the success of several leading startups and high-growth technology companies. As Founder and CEO of ImagineBC, his current mission is to unlock data for more equitable outcomes for users of data. He has kickstarted a new data economy and, in doing so, worked to align data practices with growing consumer expectations.

Prior to launching his latest venture, Erik was at the forefront of the human capital management and technology intersection with his company Benepay Technology. Benepay Technology, the parent company of ImagineBC, remains operational and well-positioned. Coupled with the successful activation of Benepay Technology, Erik also founded and, later, sold PowerPay software for $22 million. Erik is also the president of the Data Union, a global movement aimed at creating a more equitable and ethical data economy.

Erik’s industry accolades include his appointment to the Forbes Tech Council, Rolling Stone’s Culture Council, and the Radical Exchange.

German startup Protonet are spearheading the  ‘Free Your Data’ initiative to bring about the setting up of a new law that would enable individual access to personal data held by corporations.

Launched earlier last week, Free Your Data aims” to action a new law to stop the pursuit, exploitation and profit of personal information by tech giants. Initiated by Protonet, the campaign will rely on crowd activism to create lasting change to the ethical handling of digital information,” according to a recent press release.

Founder of Protonet, Ali Jelveh, explains the new law  (dubbed The European Data Sovereignty Act) as follows: “Any Company with more than 1 million (recurring) users is required to provide a requesting user with all the data associated with the user free of charge, without delay and in a machine readable format.”

“We had this idea, how cool would it be if you would know what the big companies know about you? Not that they would have to shut down their tracking systems and things like that, the only difference would be that you would also know what you know about you,” he told TechCrunch.

The campaign moves forward with the release of the first part of a set of videos (episodes) today, which will expose, “the truth behind tech business plans and will run until significant change happens,” and is intended to go viral on all forms of social media channels.

Collaborating in this campaign is Change.org with support also Co. Inc from German politicians and online activists like MPs Konstantin von Notz, Lars Klingbeil and Jimmy Schultz. TechCrunch also points out that a few third party businesses are backing the cause by providing services at below their normal business rate.

Protonet intends to bring more investors on board as the campaign progresses as a not-for-profit-organization. With a global agenda the campaign will have events across Europe, “from Hamburg to Brussels.”

Jelveh believes that an eminent result, either as a change in law or at least the proposal being tabled in the Parliament (German or EU) is possible within the next 12 months.

This move comes at the time when the EU is deliberating drafts of a union wide privacy legislation.

All images courtesy of the Free Your Data Initiative.

Low-cost airline operator Ryanair has revealed plans to implement a host of additional features to its bookings platform My Ryanair, to serve customers better.

Tuesday saw Ryanair launch its new Customer Charter and unveiled its 2015 customer experience initiatives as part of its “Always Getting Better”programme. As part of this program, the airline service provider will harness customer data to boost service quality.

“In the past year we did catch up with a lot of the things our competitors have done in terms of service, in terms of innovation and in terms of digital innovation. This year you will see us make some big investments in digital, big investments in data and that will start [to help us become a] digital innovator in the category,” said Ryanair CMO, Kenny Jacobs, speaking of the launch, reports The Drum.

Ryanair is also looking into providing cross-sell ancillary services for hotels and car hire to widen its travel service portfolio.“[Ryanair] is essentially going to be a travel retailer that specialises in flights. It’s an ambitious statement but that’s the ambition that we have when it comes to innovation in the category,” Jacobs added.

Mining customer data through customer interactions will help tailor content and improve customer retention, the company believes. Customer interaction will gain grounding through My Ryanair app which has seen 4 million customers signing up so far.

A new community feature slated for an October release will allow travellers to reveal travel information like companions and purpose, which the service provider intends to use for service improvement.

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(Image credit: Juanedc, via Flickr)

IBM has revealed plans for a cloud-centric data protection technology dubbed Identity Mixer. The tool will allow consumers to exercise more control over the information that they choose to share online, including date of birth, home address and credit card numbers.

“Identity Mixer enables users to choose precisely which data to share, and with whom”, said Christina Peters, IBM’s Chief Privacy Officer. “Now web service providers can improve their risk profile and enhance trust with customers, and it’s all in the cloud, making it easy for developers to program.”

The certified identity attributes of a user, from their age to their credit card number, et al., are encrypted with a cryptographic algorithm, to only allow selective sharing of information with third parties. Identity Mixer can be used within a digital wallet, which contains credentials certified by a trusted third party, such as a government-issued electronic identity card, explains IBM. The credential issuing authority has no access to the usage data.

Citing comScore findings, IBM points out that a person spends nearly 25 hours a month* on the internet with different Internet services, banking, shopping and social networking, creating profiles with potentially delicate data for all the different services. Without ample security, such data in wrong hands could be costly.

With a decade of research backing the concept of minimal disclosure of identity-related data to reality, Identity Mixer is now available for both computers and mobile device transactions notes Dr. Jan Camenisch, cryptographer and co-inventor of Identity Mixer at IBM Research.

Earlier it was available for download and demonstrated to work on smart cards. Now developers have access to an easy-to-use web service in IBM Bluemix, IBM’s new platform-as-a-service (PaaS) cloud that combines the strength of IBM software, third-party and open technologies.

Scientists at IBM are also working with academic and industrial partners in Europe and Australia in a two-year pilot project called Authentication and Authorization for Entrusted Unions (AU2EU), worth  8.6-million euro, to further demonstrate the new cloud version of Identity Mixer in two scenarios: in Germany with the Red Cross, and with the Commonwealth Scientific and Industrial Research Organisation (CSIRO), Australia’s national science agency, announced IBM.

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(Image credit: IBM)

Can you imagine a world without smartphones? In this day and age, the answer is a resounding ‘no’. One of the reasons for this is how profoundly we rely on apps such as Facebook, Twitter and Instagram, to name but a few. These apps connect us with friends, family or even strangers, be they across the globe or around the corner via a variety of novelty mediums.

To tap into such services, users must first sign up. The pesky asterisk deems your full name, email, date of birth as compulsory information, but also often gender, a ZIP/postal code, address, phone number and – if you are using a subscription service – bank card details. This is easily enough information to create a sketchy profile on any individual –  and that is before you start using their service. When that begins, you will be, whether you realise it or not, voluntarily offering the company snippets into your day to day life, primarily intended for people you actually know.

Facebook is a prime example; as a website and app that boasts approximately 1.28bn users (as of June 2014), it has developed from an idea into a corporate giant. Of that total, 802 million people log into Facebook daily with 556m accessing Facebook via their smartphone or tablet and 189m of those being “mobile only” users. Every 60 seconds, 510 comments are posted, 293,000 statuses are updated and 136,000 photos are uploaded.

Interestingly, however, each time you log into Facebook, share content, or publish a Tweet, the information you offer is being processed, logged and recorded. How do you think “Trending Topics” are created, or recommendations on who to follow next are so accurate?  Such information reveals what users find popular (or unpopular), and – as most free apps are fuelled by advertising – offers you similar content in an attempt to urge you to part from the cash in your wallet.

The most frustrating thing about Privacy Policies however, is the level of ambiguity in how user information is processed and shared. Facebook states that: ‘While you are allowing us to use the information we receive about you, you always own all of your information.’ So far, so standard; this is what users expect from any business. However, as we read on, the policy states that information will not be shared unless they have ‘received your permission‘, ‘given you notice‘ or ‘removed your name or any other personally identifying information from [the data]‘. According to this, Facebook allows itself to use your information so long as your name is no longer attached to it, or alternately, it has informed you.

But what if it has told you and you do not wish to participate? Presumably, the only way to avert this would be to terminate your profile, and in that instance, would the information you had previously provided still be used even though you no longer use the service? Absolutely. Twitter are a bit more specific, stating,

‘your public user profile information and public Tweets are immediately delivered via SMS and our APIs to our partners and other third parties, including search engines, developers, and publishers that integrate Twitter content into their services, and institutions such as universities and public health agencies that analyze the information for trends and insights‘.

They also urge users to ‘think carefully’ about the information which they choose to make public accordingly.

Outside of the bigger corporations, the trend continues. Even comparably smaller services such as Last.fm are equally ambiguous about the data usage, their privacy policy stating that:

‘These people may use this information for their own purposes, which may be either commercial or non-commercial in nature and may include targeted advertising or direct marketing. These third parties may be based in the U.K. or elsewhere in the world.’

That many ‘may’s in a sentence leaves a lot of room for manoeuvre. It is safe to presume that users have no real idea of where their content and personal information may end up, or for what purposes it may be being used.

So what options do social media addicts have, should they be adverse to adverts and compromising on personal information security? Aside from abandoning the internet altogether, burgeoning social network Ello may hold the answer. Dubbed as the “anti-Facebook” and still in beta-mode, the unprecedented clamour to access the website has had its creators dealing with approximately 35,000 invites to access every hour, with that number being expected to grow as word of mouth spreads. Its manifesto is punchy and immediate:

‘Your social network is owned by advertisers. Every post you share, every friend you make, and every link you follow is tracked, recorded, and converted into data. Advertisers buy your data so they can show you more ads. You are the product that’s bought and sold. We believe there is a better way.’

And whilst Ello does collect user data via Google Analytics, they state:

‘before information about you is stored on Google’s servers, [the user’s] IP address is stripped and anonymized [meaning that] to the best of [Ello’s] knowledge, this also makes what [users] do on Ello useless to Google for advertising purposes‘.

However, in the name of profitability, users can opt to pay to add features to their profiles including enhanced privacy features, according to Ello’s designer Todd Berger. That said, seeing as tech users are being constantly barraged with adverts to buy this, that and the other, they may as well purchase a cyber-shield, right?

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Kayleigh Watson is a recent English and Creative Writing graduate from Birmingham City University who has had a vested passion for writing since her early years.

Having contributed content to a variety of publications that centre around subjects she is personally passionate about, including the arts and feminism, she is keen to explore how Big Data affects the day-to-day existence of tech users around the world.

(Image source: Mike Mozart)

Google suffered a disruptive defeat yesterday, when Europe’s top court ruled search engines should erase links to ‘outdated’ or ‘irrelevant’ information on individuals upon their request. The case was brought forward by Mario Costeja González, a Spanish national who complained to Google after searches of his name brought up an article from 1998, stating his property was to be be auctioned to pay off outstanding welfare debts. The ruling espouses the so-called ‘Right to be Forgotten’, and represents a shift in the balance between personal privacy and freedom of speech on the internet.

The EU Justice Commissioner, Viviane Reding, described the victory as a “clear victory for the protection of personal data of Europeans”.

“The ruling confirms the need to bring today’s data protection rules from the “digital stone age” into today’s modern computing world,” she added. The EU proposed a law ensuring the ‘The Right to be Forgotten’ online back in 2012; yesterday’s ruling is thought to be the first in a series of major updates and revisions to the 1995 Data Protection Directive.

However, not all response to the ruling was so positive- campaign group Index on Censorship stated it “violates the fundamental principles of freedom of expression. It allows individuals to complain to search engines about information they do not like with no legal oversight,” they stated. “This is akin to marching into a library and forcing it to pulp books.” Google is also said to be disappointed by the decision; Google won earlier stages of this legal battle, insisting the onus to remove online material lies with the website and not the search provider. Yesterday’s ruling by Court of Justice of the European Union cannot be appealed or overturned.

The exact implications of this ruling are not yet clear. What is known is that the ruling does not mean search engines absolutely must remove search results upon request. The ruling stated individuals can submit a claim to search engines directly, which “must then duly examine its merits”. Search engines must then consider “the legitimate interest of Internet users potentially interested in having access to that information”. If consensus cannot be reached, the case will be referred to a local judge or regulator.

Google have already restricted search results in some parts of the European Union- in Germany and France, for instance, they’ve restricted searches on fascist paraphernalia and hate-inciting speeches. Though in the wake of this landmark privacy ruling, with more expected to follow, it’s unclear now what impact these restrictions will have in the struggle between the privacy of personal data and the freedom of the internet.

Read more here.

(Photo credit: Robert Scoble)