Consumers utilize and accumulate massive amounts of personal data in their everyday lives. From financial records to purchasing history to geographic location data; they depend on this data to deliver personalized online services and experiences. This interesting topic came to us from Open Access Government in their article, “The future of public services means giving citizens control over their own data.”
However, when it comes to government services, citizens often experience the exact opposite, finding themselves having to create new accounts for every government department and inputting the same information repeatedly. Why is the public sector experience so different, and why isn’t data shared across the government?
The “how” is easy. The technology exists. Giving people control over their own data can have a dramatic impact on their quality of life. Not only is this better for individuals, but it also helps the government to run more efficiently.
Many believe the solution can be found is blockchain technology. It can be secured so that the user can choose to share it only with a select group of people or institutions, in much the same way that people already share data between the apps on their smartphones.
Melody K. Smith
Sponsored by Data Harmony, a unit of Access Innovations, the world leader in indexing and making content findable.
