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The Federal Council is asked to consider how best to help citizens regain control over their personal data.
The digitization of the economy and society is based, among other things, on the transmission of personal data that is thus beyond the control of the individual. This no longer has to be the case, however, because it is now possible to move from uncontrolled “Big Data” (mass data) to responsible “Self-Data” (self-determination over one’s own data). To achieve this, a policy of “Smart Disclosure” is being pursued in the USA. This involves getting private companies or public agencies to give citizens free access to their data via open and standardized formats that allow easy reuse of the data.
In this way, individuals can share their personal data with others, sell it or evaluate it for themselves.
These new needs would lead to the emergence of an entire industry of innovative digital service providers.
Justification
Three circumstances indicate that the principle of “self-data” will develop and spread quickly:
1. digital technologies today enable decentralization on an unprecedented scale.
2. even though many still give out their personal data without further ado, the need to regain some control over it is becoming more and more widespread.
3. the position of end users is increasingly strengthened by legislation, e.g. in the European General Data Protection Regulation, which was adopted in May 2016 and will come into force throughout the EU from May 2018.
In the healthcare sector, health insurers, hospitals, laboratories and doctors could network and give all patients access to information that concerns them. They could then, if they so wished, share it with their family and primary care physicians, resell it, make it available to a research institute or evaluate it for health coaching. The “self-data” principle could also be applied in other areas such as taxes, energy consumption or school careers.
Managing “self-data” would lead to new services such as the data vault, access to critical health information in the event of an accident, collection of personal metrics from networked devices for health advice, or gamified simulation of energy consumption. These are all business opportunities that could be exploited by our companies.