TheJakartaPost
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Big data and the thorn of ethical implications
When an information and communications technology company approached a big private organization in Indonesia to offer the use of an online learning application for the organization’s thousands of schools and connect them throughout the country, some of the board members of the organization expressed curiosity about where the company would store the immense data of the schools.
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Illustration of data protection (Shutterstock.com/Boiko Y)
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hen an information and communications technology (ICT) company approached a big private organization in Indonesia to offer the use of an online learning application for the organization’s thousands of schools and connect them throughout the country, some of the board members of the organization expressed curiosity about where the company would store the immense data of the schools.
As the company said the data would be digitally stored in the cloud, the board members flatly rejected the idea, as they feared the data, which includes personal data of teachers, students and even parents, could be misused.
They said they would like the big data of their schools to be stored on a server located in the organization’s compound.
Also, during a recent workshop on big data in Jakarta, at least three people raised concerns of privacy and ethics related to the use of private data.
Indeed, having our data incongruously exposed could lead to unintended or even harmful consequences.
We know that criminals track our status on social media to determine when they would break into our house. We‘ve heard about Mark Zuckerberg being questioned by the United States Congress about accusations of Facebook giving a social engineering firm illicit access to the personal details of social media users.
We also heard about Cambridge Analytica being suspected of interfering in elections on a number of continents.
