A private life: What does the public think of personal data stores?

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Everything you do, type, see, buy, watch or listen to online creates data. Despite its importance to organisations worldwide, it is widely believed that, in this hi-tech age we, as humans, have limited control over the data we create.

But what if you had a tool that allowed you to decide who has access to your information and gave you ownership over your personal details, even down to your consumer spending patterns or carbon footprint?

A personal data store (PDS) is an attempt to rectify the lack of data privacy online. It is a fledgling idea for a service that allows an individual to store, manage and use their personal data in a highly secure and structured way, as well as controlling who can access that information. This could mean sharing details with a mortgage provider for the duration of a mortgage application, for example, and then choosing to remove access later. It could also include analysing – and even ...