3 startups to earn with their data

Innovative companies working on the monetization of personal data are coming onto the market. Here's how they work

Big data (Getty Images) There are those who consider them the new oil: our data, a precious resource on which empires like Google and Facebook stand, and whose ability to aggregate them would guarantee, according to some , if not a place in paradise, at least one seat in politics. But without disturbing the maximum systems, it is true that the traces that we have left around the net for some time are at the center of a new discourse where economics and civil rights meet. Data as a bulwark to defend and also as a source of income: data monetization. Many companies are working on it and although the road seems difficult for now, something seems to be moving. Here are three examples of startups working on this front.

Mine

Rising star of the Israeli startup ecosystem, it aims to help us find all the web services we have left our information over time. To do this, it uses an artificial intelligence system, which reads our inbox and identifies the registration emails to the various web services, to which it subsequently requests the deletion of data.

How it works: to activate the process it is necessary visit Saymine.com, click on the Get started button and choose from three options: knowing who owns our data; discover how our digital footprint affects us; regain possession of the information. Once we have made our choice, we will be asked to register via Google or Microsoft, so that the algorithm can probe our email on one of the two providers.

it only Takes a few minutes to know which and how many companies have our data. The result may surprise you: the web app even delves in between the email buried in the archives of Gmail and Hotmail and find the services that nine out of ten times we forgot to be enrolled. Such analysis is finished, Mine presents the list of companies that have our personal information, and you can send them an email to ask for the cancellation. To enable this process, simply click to Take quick action , choose one-to-one sites and services which we want to remove the mayor on our data and click on Let's reclaim . At that point, an email with the request and we can follow all developments, as we connect to the site.

Weople

it Is an app, developed by startup milan Hoda , whose mission is to be the link between us and the companies that have our data: he claims them in the name of the Gdpr , the european regulation on the protection of personal data.

How it works: once enrolled, Weople looking for clients-companies interested in our data, which are segmented according to target precise but in a strictly anonymous form: in this way, companies do not stop to make a buck, rather, are a public that is sensitive to their offers, and we get a small compensation , without losing control of the data. The app offers, in short, as a kind of bank that holds our data and enhances them.

“ it's A great opportunity for people to get hold of their data and increase competition in the market of the same data. We talk about how much each of us produces on a daily basis but that currently is fully exploited by others, ” he explained to Wired a few months ago, the ceo of Hoda, Silvio Siliprandi, the former number one of Gfk Eurisko: “ Weople wants to make free people of act rights such as data portability in its favour, or the review of consents data to the current owners ”.

So at least in theory. Even if the Gdpr recognises the right to data portability, Weople has encountered some problems in getting the data back from the companies, that before giving data to a third party wants to see things clearly. There is also those who solicited the intervention of the Guarantor of privacy, which in turn is waiting for the european Committee for the protection of personal data ( Edpb ) to give an opinion on the activities of the Weople, seen that – writes Antonello Soro – the startup “ can produce effects in more than one State of the Union ”.

Gener8

Founded by the former marketing director of Red Bull, Sam Jones, Gener8 works through a browser extension (Chrome and Firefox), and it promises to make us earn from the advertisements that we watch online.

How it works: registrandoci to the service, Gener8 show ads based on our interests, and assigns a point every time we look at an ad. These points later can be exchanged with other products, Amazon vouchers or converted to donations of money to charity . And the advantage is not only for the users. According to the developers, the advertising agencies earn us: in Great Britain, where she was born, Gener8 says to boast a higher click-through rate of 760% compared to the standard.

“ The fact that there is so much value derived from our personal data, but do not even know who is picking up and, without having any return, is ridiculous, ” explained Jones in an interview: “ I Think that one day ripenseremo to this period, and we will ask ourselves how ever did that happen ”. To raise awareness among users of the internet, Gener8 has recently launched a petition to convince the English parliament to accept the idea of a dividing digital data , which provides that those who do not want their information to be collected online, they can decide with a click, and that the company compensate financially the people to whom they sell their data. For now it seems only a utopia. But maybe in the future.