Day 1 Keynote Own Your Data Taking Control of our Digital Future

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good morning everyone and thank you so much for  having me thank you to the pearson global forum   in university of chicago and all of the teams  involved for the invitation and of course for   organizing such an incredible event that i'm  so honored to be a part of i'm here today to   speak to you about what i believe is one of  the most important issues that we are facing   in the world today i call this talk own your  data taking control of our digital future   because unfortunately at a time where the  entire world has been nearly forced to lead   a completely digital life for the past year  and a half we have been completely unprepared   for what that means for us to be producing  exponentially more personal data than ever before   for the dangers of social media to even be  reaching our children who are now on social   media and devices nearly all of the time  even for their education we are living in   a digital world yet we don't really have defined  digital rights in most countries around the world   so considering what our rights should be what we  want them to be and what we're going to fight for   is so important and becomes more  pressing of an issue every single day you've probably heard this one before but  in october 2017 the economist told us that   data had now become more valuable than oil and gas   data is the world's most valuable  asset a multi-trillion dollar industry   that makes decisions for every single move that  we make both private and public organizations   use data in order to drive strategy in order to  drive sales in order to make every single decision   that affects government business  military and everything in between so somehow all of us have become the producers  of the world's most valuable asset class an asset that is bought and sold and traded  around the world second to second creating   trillions of dollars of value yet somehow we as  the producers of this incredibly valuable asset   somehow have been left  without rights to that value and you think well how did we  really get into this situation   over the past many decades the world's  largest companies have developed into   multi-billion dollar or even trillion dollar  corporations their value is completely made up   of the data that has been  collected from us the users over the past many decades these technologies  have been built specifically to be as extractive   as possible and what i mean by that is that the  technologies are specifically built to take away   as much information from us as possible and  use that data in order to create strategies   models advertisements products and everything  that a business would decide every single day   so this incredibly valuable  data that we are producing   now has created the world's most  valuable industries i like to call these   companies or these technologies that they're  built upon legacy technologies because i don't   believe that these legacy technologies  are going to be used in the future today we're really at a turning point where  technologies of the past that were built to   take away as much from us as possible without us  explicitly understanding what we are agreeing to   where information is going who gets  to use it and of course whether or   not it's going to be monetized or if  we have the right to revoke our consent the right to delete the right to  say we don't want to participate   and still be able to use technology  we're at this turning point   where we have the ability to start to build a more  ethical transparent and consensual digital future so how did i get here why am i one of the people  that should be talking to you about this issue   so i started working in technology originally  when i came back home to chicago in 2007   after leaving college to  join the first obama campaign   i was so excited to become a part  of barack obama's new media team   one of the first five people to join and it was  there where we invented what is now known as   social media strategy we were the first team  to ever use social media instead of just for   peer-to-peer communications for larger scale  campaigns and the first to use it for politics   and what i saw was that the more data  we were able to collect about what   people were doing on social media what  they cared about what they believed in the higher we could get people to engage  in politics for me this was a net positive   of course as a political activist someone that  had especially worked in environmental campaigning   earlier in my career i thought that if i could use  data to get millions of people to actually care   about politics to show up and vote to register to  vote for the first time to actually get involved   in political organizing this was an incredible  opportunity to make sure that people who perhaps   had never gotten involved in politics  before could now start to learn how to   make a difference a tangible difference in the  lives of their families and their communities so as i saw our campaign barack obama's first  presidential start to break all known records   for fundraising for turnout for voter registration  i thought that technology was definitely the key   to being successful in politics now a couple  years later i was completing my law school i had   done multiple law degrees in human rights law and  had started to study for my phd i was writing my   doctoral thesis on something called preventive  diplomacy what preventive diplomacy means is   how do decision makers presidents prime ministers  ambassadors heads of united nations departments   how do they make decisions in order to  stop crisis or stop war before it happens and as i thought i was going to be writing  a legal thesis i thought i was going to   be writing about diplomatic strategy  and different political philosophies   instead most of my research ended up centering  around what type of data did decision makers have   what data was being collected from where how was  it being modeled how was that analysis actually   getting into the the hands of decision makers and  how quickly were those mechanisms actually working   and how good was the modeling and analysis that  was being done off of that data so given that   my law school couldn't really teach me much  about advanced predictive analytics i ended   up having a friend introduced me to someone he  knew that was running a top data science company   he introduced me to the ceo of a company you've  probably heard of called cambridge analytica   and while i was doing my doctoral thesis i ended  up joining that company part-time as a consultant   in order to learn as much as i could about  data and data science so i could finish my phd   now that's probably not how you thought  i ended up at cambridge analytica   but that's how i got there and over the many  years that i spent at that company i think i   learned a lot more about data and especially  data and politics than i ever bargained for over my years there i started to  see that a company that was small   we were a tech startup that even a company  as small as mine was able to purchase   and license personal data about people all  around the world and that this data collection   was not only rampant it was an untold amount  of information about every person that had   ever touched a device even data files about  people who had never used technology before   and that data was either purchasable or licensable  or even just available for free for the taking and i started to realize that the amount  of information that exists about us   is exponentially more than  we probably ever expected and when cambridge analytica was speaking to  clients around the world it seemed that most   clients had no idea what they could or couldn't do  with data and therefore we're seeking to use data   to get an edge on their political  campaign on their government program   for their company's advertising and sales purposes   and mostly none of these conversations ever  touched on the rights of the individual   every single large-scale data analytics  conversation i would have with a client   ended up centering around how they could leverage  people's personal information in order to reach   their own goals and of course there were plenty of  clients and projects that were a hundred percent   positive and well-meaning but the further  i went down this rabbit hole the more that   i learned that some clients were not using any  ethical or moral basis for making their decisions   and that they would stop at nothing to use  people's personal information for personal gain   so i decided to leave cambridge analytica and  become a whistleblower in march 2018 now three   and a half years ago i came out with a package of  documents to the guardian newspaper and began my   process speaking with regulators investigators  and government officials all around the world   about what cambridge analytica and facebook  had done in political campaigns like brexit   and trump what they had done in political  campaigns all around the world for so many years   how had people's facebook data come into  the hands of not just a small startup   but over 40 000 other companies that had  paid facebook to get access to user data   many of them who then sold it on in the  open market what does this mean for people's   electoral and political rights what does  this mean for the concept of data rights are data rights human rights do we have  the human right to privacy how do we secure   any sort of transparency or consent  into how our information is used   and what do we do to protect our elections  our democracy and of course the rest of our   human rights that are affected by some of  these technical systems this data collection   and our entire digital life and  interaction with technology itself so another reason why i believe that this is one  of the most important issues today is because   we are just looking at the tip of the iceberg for  the past many years we have seen the data crisis   become bigger every single time when we see a  large-scale hack in the news when we see another   company where all of its user data has been  compromised when we see another government or   political party that has used people's personal  information in order to undermine democracy as we go into a world that is run by  the internet of things iot or even   our coffee machines and our robot vacuums will be  reporting about the types of data that we produce   when we move into a world of smart cities  infrastructure where our cars and the way   we use public transport the way we walk around  public streets will be recorded and producing data   when we move into a world of advanced  predictive analytics and artificial intelligence   where data will run through absolutely everything  that we touch and every decision that is made we need to make sure before we get to that point that we understand what our data rights  are that we have more defined rights   and that we have really stood up for what we seek  in order to have a more ethical digital future so i think it's important for us to really dive  deep into how we are protected or unprotected   by some concepts legally regulatory on the  technological technological level as well   as in terms of education and awareness what are  these big concepts that we have to grapple with the biggest concept of all the overarching  umbrella under which everything falls is   digital trust what i mean by digital trust  is transparency consent accountability   ownership and now of course also sustainability so for transparency what i mean   is for us to actually understand what data is  being taken from us when we're using technology perhaps you could raise your hand if you've ever   actually read terms and conditions of  any of the applications on your phone if i could see the entire audience i bet i  wouldn't see that many hands unfortunately because   all of the technology products that we use every  single day are designed specifically for us   not to know what is taken from us 40 or 50  pages of legalese are designed so that we do   not understand and that we will quickly scroll  through and agree and allow that application to   take as much information as they can possibly  get away with so transparency means fixing that   it means making sure we actually understand  where our data is going and what is going on next is consent can you really  call something informed consent   if less than one percent of people  have read those terms and conditions   just ticking that terms and conditions  box is not exactly enough for me   to call that informed now finally government  agencies are starting to agree with me there   we've seen recent decisions come out  of the federal trade commission the ftc   saying that data collection that is not explicitly  informed consent undermines consumers rights   therefore we need to start moving to a consent  model where we have clear and transparent terms   and conditions perhaps bullet points that are  at a third grade reading level or lower where   we actually understand what information  is going to be collected where it's going   and who it's going to be shared with and of  course in the end how it's going to be used   this is where we come to accountability  especially on a technical level being accountable   for where data is going who it's going to be used  by and what it's going to be used for right now   we might be able to say in europe under gdpr that  we don't want our data used for a certain purpose   but anyone that chooses not to follow legal or  ethical guidelines could decide to take that data   and use it for purposes that the original user did  not agree to on a technical level how do we start   to be able to use advanced forms of encryption and  blockchain technologies so that we know that our   data is never going to reach hands that we did  not agree for it to be in and it would never be   used for purposes that we didn't explicitly  consent to that's so incredibly important   next is my favorite conversation which is  ownership who owns the data that is being produced   of course i'm the producer and right now under  most countries laws around the world i don't own   any of that data right now 100 of  that data is owned by the platform on which i'm producing that data for example if  i log into facebook all of the data that i create   within facebook even the data that i upload  to facebook like my personal photos and videos   those no longer belong to me all of that data 100   belongs to facebook and it says  so in the terms and conditions   which is why i really implore you to read them  especially for applications that you're using   every single day but ownership what is the  future of ownership in order to own our data   we are slowly starting to see changing laws  not just in the united states but in many   other countries where if we were able to flip  this model on its head where we owned the data   and if a platform was helping us produce data  then they could own a percentage of it as well   even the majority percentage  because of the amount of money   that they have invested into creating this  platform so perhaps if i owned my data   and i decided to use facebook to produce more data  the data that i produce in facebook could be 20   owned by me and 80 owned by facebook that would  mean when and whenever any of that information   is used for monetization purposes for ads  or any other revenue generating activity   that i would get a 20 dividend off of  the back of that that's what that means   and i'm starting to meet with more regulators  more policymakers that believe that this could be   really the way forward and i'll touch a little bit  more on that in a moment lastly is sustainability   our drive into a technical future  means that we are starting to use   more energy more large-scale data centers around  the world from processing this data and as we   start to use safer more reliable transparent  consensual technologies like blockchain   running algorithms that encrypt all of our data so  that it is safe it is private and we can control   it that requires a lot of energy so making sure  that the technology that we use is sustainable   is one of the last frontiers in making  sure that technology remains ethical so i think this is an important point um  which a lot of people don't expect me to make   which is that i'm not a privacy campaigner i  think the word privacy means that if you share   your data something bad will happen so you need  to keep things private in order to remain safe what privacy actually means to me is that you  have the ability to share your data without   sharing your personal details details that make  up what's called a digital identity my name my   address my social security number my birthday  any personal information that might normally be   on my driver's license or my passport all of that  data would never be shared i could for instance   decide to share my favorite color or what i had  for breakfast in the morning without it explicitly   being linked to me and then i would be able to  participate in what i see as a very exciting   technical future driven by ai and the internet of  things and smart cities i think the more data that   we are able to produce the faster we are going  to solve a lot of the world's greatest problems and what i mean by that is when we have  great smart cities infrastructure you're   going to see that we won't have any more traffic  accidents or mass shootings or terrorist attacks   if we are able to use more ai we're going to be  able to solve a lot of the world's most pressing   medical problems right now most of the medical  data collected is from 18 to 35 year old young   white males that go in college for extra money  to medical trials most of us don't have an easy   way of sharing our medical data and therefore  it never gets into the hands of researchers   so women and minorities don't have medicines work  as well on us and that's a data sharing issue   i really believe if we're able to share  data securely privately and anonymously   that we will be able to make the world  a better place that we will be able to   prevent war and crisis that's how i  got into this game in the first place   i was never involved in technology until i became  an activist and i saw that using technology can   help us achieve positive social impact goals much  faster and at a much wider scale than ever before   and what i really mean by data ownership   and this is the most important point  i'll make during this entire talk what i mean by data ownership is  that if we own the value of our data   if we own our piece of this  multi-trillion dollar industry   that every single day we could make at minimum  enough money to feed ourselves and our family yes   you heard me right your data is currently worth  at minimum enough to purchase your groceries with and a couple dollars a day might not mean  much to some of the people listening to this   but for billions of people around the world  living in poverty or on the poverty line who   have difficulty meeting their most basic of human  rights which is access to food and clean water   a couple dollars a day completely  changes their entire world   and that's what data ownership is all about that  anyone with a device could start to earn money   on their device for deciding to share their data  and that they could do that safely securely and   anonymously and all of us every single day  because we are contributors and producers   to the world's most valuable asset class that  multi-trillion dollar industry that is running   every single thing that any company or  government or military does every single day that we take that piece of  ownership and we get what   famously andrew yang or governor gavin newsom  called the data dividend that we get a dividend   of the worth of our data's value and then we have  the ability to encourage more data production   and more wealth generation and a universal  earned income for everybody around the world and so there are multiple ways to solve  these issues both on the educational level   the regulatory and legislative level as  well as for technology on the education   level i started the own your data foundation  you can look it up at ownyourdata.foundation we are partnered with the dq institute where  we teach a curriculum that is called dq like   iq or eq dq is a digital intelligence quotient  that is made up of all of these indicator sets   where you get a score of how digitally intelligent  you are do you understand your data rights are you   digitally literate can you are you media literate  so you can spot fake news and disinformation   do you know how to use empathy when you are  online so that you can prevent cyber bullying   and protect your mental health and  well-being while using social media   do you understand how to manage your screen  time your digital footprint and your reputation   all of these play into what is called dq on the  legal and regulatory front i have helped write   a lot of the digital asset and privacy  laws in the united states as well as   working with plenty of other countries on  their first data protection laws or digital   asset laws and one of the most important pieces  of legislative infrastructure or writing is that   your digital assets are your intangible personal  property because when your data is your property   then you have the ability to protect it  property rights are the strongest form of law   and we are starting to see that becoming  a more popular model around the world   in privacy legislation and then of course i'm a  big fan of blockchain technology i know i've just   run out of time so i will close up where i believe  that using advanced forms of encryption and secure   and and private networks where we are actually  able to make sure that our data is safe and it is   only going where we have allowed it to and only  be being used for purposes to which we agreed   so i'll close this with my favorite quote  from the late great dr stephen hawking   where he used to always say that technology  will allow us to live in luxurious leisure   where we build technology and we engage with  technology specifically because it can make   everyone's lives better and i do believe that  you might say i'm an eternal optimist but i   have always been in technology because i believe  that it will have a positive effect on everyone's   lives and a positive effect on our future and  so now we all have to work together to make sure   that that is true we can protect our digital  future by engaging today and so thank you so   much for inviting me here thank you for having me  and i hope you all enjoy the rest of the summit

2021-10-22

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