No. Just no
Google and co join gov's identity marketplace
Google is among 26 companies that have signed up to the government's latest effort to create a British business sector out of the handling of private data and an individual's online identity. data_eye_midata_logo The logo depicts the comforting eye of Sauron midata... UK.gov prefers to cast this agenda as part of its push …
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Friday 4th November 2011 08:51 GMT D Moss Esq
Calling all mooncalves
For a brief while there yesterday, there was a story on the BIS website called "The midata vision of consumer empowerment". It's gone now.
But there is a press release, available at http://nds.coi.gov.uk/content/Detail.aspx?ReleaseID=421869&NewsAreaID=2
And Ed Davey, the minister responsible, has blogged on midata at http://blogs.bis.gov.uk/blog/2011/11/03/giving-consumers-the-midata-touch/#comment-2054
1. The claim is made repeatedly that midata empowers people and that midata gives them unprecedented control over the use of their personal data. How? BIS give no answer. Suppose you fill your "personal data inventory" (PDI) with a lot of your Lloyds Bank data (Lloyds are one of the midata partners) and then pass a selection of that data to British Gas (another midata partner), perhaps to open an account, how can you control what British Gas do with the data? You can't. You get no new powers with a PDI than you had before there were any PDIs. There is no sense in which you are newly empowered. The BIS press release is misleading.
2. There are unexplained claims that having a PDI will help you to make decisions. Unexplained, at least, in the BIS press release. But there is an explanation here -- http://forum.no2id.net/viewtopic.php?f=2&t=35514 The purveyors of PDIs, previously known as PDSs, believe that analysing the data in your PDI will help you to decide who to marry, see particularly comments at 08 Jun 2011 18:19:11
3. midata is clearly closely related to the Cabinet Office's Identity Assurance scheme (IdA) as noted by ElReg. At least it should be. But on Monday 31 October 2011, the Cabinet Office held an IdA conference. The impression was that they were in control. There was no mention of midata, which appeared, unheralded, three days later on Thursday 3 November. Is midata, as FatsBrannigan asks, and so do I, a freelance operation by BIS? Is the Cabinet Office in control?
4. Ed Davey is Lib Dem MP for Kingston and Surbiton. Here he is claiming that the UK economy can be expanded by making it easier for people to give their data to marketers in a handily formatted container designed to suit them. Socially dodgy. Economically dodgy. Politically dodgy.
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Friday 4th November 2011 10:11 GMT Anonymous Coward
I posted some similar awkward questions to Ed Davey's blog posting
The moderator hasn't deemed them fit for publication yet.
My final, slightly mischievous, question to Mr Davey was - had they done a trademark search on midata before going live? If not, I hope they've included a budget item for lawyers.
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Saturday 5th November 2011 19:33 GMT Andrew Yeomans
Not gone...
"The midata vision of consumer empowerment" http://www.bis.gov.uk/news/topstories/2011/Nov/midata
"Midata - access and control your personal data" http://www.bis.gov.uk/policies/consumer-issues/personal-data
Strategy document: http://www.bis.gov.uk/policies/consumer-issues/consumer-empowerment
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Friday 4th November 2011 10:17 GMT John Smith 19
‘"risk of serious consumer detriment if data is lost, leaked, misused or stolen."
Quite true.
Personal data is *valuable*
Far too much so to left in *any* of these peoples hands.
Let alone shared.
If the Nation ID Card scheme was "no need to ask, no need to know, " this one looks like a case of
"No need to have, no need to share".