Personal Containers

Do you record your digital tracks? Do you know what your digital footprint is?

A key research challenge within Horizon is to enable people to track the information trails that they create as they operate in the modern, network connected world.

As we go about our daily lives, more and more digital data is being collected about us, creating our very own digital footprint.  From prescriptions, loyalty cards, social networking through to using your mobile phone, various businesses and other organisations collect data of our lives: where we live and shop, who we interact with, our health, and many others.

Our digital footprint continues to grow as the world becomes increasingly network connected.  A key challenge of the digital economy is to build the infrastructure that allows individuals to control how, when and by whom this data is used.  This could significantly impact many businesses, from advertisers and market researchers to service providers.  For example, it may impose controls on those who have been able to gather and process data relatively freely.  At the same time, it will enable individuals to expose the richness of their personal data to a market, generating value both for the individual and the business that processes it.

Take a look at the Personal Containers poster

Dataware is the framework we are designing to enable this market to come into existence.  Within this framework, your data is collected and stored by both existing and new organisations and services.  Via a personal container, companies will be able to acquire permission to perform specific processing on some or all of the data sources that make up your datasphere.  By controlling the processing that can be carried out, and by managing the permissions granted to data processors, you exercise control over what happens to your data while also becoming able to create new value from your digital footprint.

http://perscon.net/