Subsequent speakers addressed key questions. Peter Elias (University of Warwick) made a strong case supporting data linkage, in part to complement surveys, which are plagued with response rates that have fallen from 95% to nearer 40% in some cases. Moreover, our “crown jewels”—the UK longitudinal surveys—are expensive to run, with a cloud over future funding given the current environment.
Rob Procter (University of Warwick) explored how big data, linkage and analytics are challenging core assumptions of much social science research: data are not identifiable, the number of india rcs data researchers is small, and uses can be specified in advance. Rob pointed out limitations of current procedures for consent and anonymisation. into the foreground. At the UK Data Service, we have been working on the ethics implications of new forms of data. I looked at core challenges to consent and anonymisation here and our Big Data Reading Group will be discussing “Big Data’s End Run around Anonymity and Consent”, a chapter by Barocas and Nissenbaum in Lane, et al. (ed) Privacy, Big Data, and the Public Good.
Rob asked the audience a brilliant question: How many people work for Facebook? Guesses ranged from a few 100s to over 10,000. In fact, it is about 10,000. For comparison, IBM has very roughly 400,000 employees. Rob’s answer? About one billion. Of course, all Facebook users “work for” Facebook by handing over their data, for free, to the company. It was a memorable way of making the point: if theservice is free, you are the product.