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Self data, portability, "data altruism", personal cloud: new models of personal data management are being sought

Published on 16 February 2021
Update on 26 September 2022
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Summary

While personal data is currently captured and monetized by platforms without real consent, the control and ability to act of users are at the heart of "self data".

Providing real means of control over personal data: this approach has been the subject of experiments for several years: in the United States (My Data Initiatives), the United Kingdom (midata) or even Finland (MyData Finland). Since 2019, in France, three territories (Nantes, La Rochelle and Greater Lyon) have been experimenting with territorial Self Data.

These alternative models for managing and protecting personal data have been attracting renewed interest in recent months.

  • The right to data portability, established by the European Regulation on the Protection of Personal Data (RGPD), gives users the possibility to recover part of their data in order to store them or transmit them to third parties in order to facilitate their re-use for personal purposes.
  • The Data Governance Act (a draft European regulation currently being prepared) proposes to encourage data sharing by regulating the activities of data sharing service providers in order to guarantee " trust . It also imagines a regime called data altruismfor companies that agree to share their data with non-profit organizations, in order to allow the development of applications of general interest
  • In the report For a public policy on datathe deputy Eric Bothorel recommends "to encourage initiatives of citizen data portability in the service of the general interest, in particular by the organization of campaigns of citizen mobilization".
  • At the end of December, the Banque des Territoires drew up an "inventory of the self data ecosystem".
  • The Fondation Internet Nouvelle Génération (Fing), finally, announces the upcoming drafting of a roadmap for the implementation of Territorial Self Data at the European level.

Towards a "citizen data portability" in the service of the general interest

In the report For a public policy on datasubmitted to the Prime Minister in December 2020, the deputy Eric Bothorel points out the dual nature of the right to data portability, introduced by RGPD. " This right is often presented as a way for users to control and master the use of their data. It is also a tool for economic regulation insofar as it aims to limit the effects of locking customers into a closed ecosystem. Portability is supposed to enable better competition between digital service providers.

The Bothorel mission emphasizes, however, that in Europe, and particularly in France, "several actors have not waited for the implementation of the RGPD to test new ways of sharing personal data, under the control of users . She notes that " local actors, and primarily European cities and metropolises, are often at the forefront of these issues, often ahead of national governments.

The Bothorel mission recommends "encouraging citizen data portability initiatives in the general interest" and mentions three possible ways for the State to intervene:

  • Identify, support and accelerate existing experiments at the local level that aim to give individuals back control over their data and mobilize them in the management of certain territorial policies (energy, mobility, etc.) or for causes of general interest (monitoring travel in times of health crisis).
  • at the national level, organize and promote citizen mobilization campaigns on a limited number of major causes each year in order to show that they can be effective and create a ripple effect;
  • support the emergence and adoption of turnkey technological solutions that enable the right to portability to be put into practice

Référence :

The Banque des Territoires draws up a state of the art of self-data  

In a study which proposes an inventory of the ecosystem of self-data actors, La Banque des Territoires has undertaken " to provide a clear and updated vision of the actors who propose solutions to implement self-data, of the brakes and levers that must be taken into account, and of the initiatives that can serve as an example for launching such a project in turn".

If "the technical and legal bases of such a model exist (...), the diffusion of these tools, practices and methods remains marginal".

  • in the banking sector, legislation had already imposed the portability of personal data: the availability of this data has allowed the creation of new services, the banking aggregators which have more than 4 million users in France
  • in the mobility sector, the centralization of data by the individual in a Personal Mobility Account is particularly suited to the implementation of MaaS and is the subject of experimental work.
  • Other use cases resulting from the portability of personal data are developing: energy coaching services based on the Enédis API, and authentication services based on digital identity (such as telephone number).
"In the absence of available data and sufficient use cases, personal cloud offerings are still struggling to gain traction as a data management infrastructure."

Four types of actors are involved in self data:

  • Individuals: they occupy a central position: " their consent is essential to any data sharing and it is they who select the services that have access to their data. It is also their use of the new services that determines the success of these applications.
  • Data holders: the companies that collect personal data. "In theory, they have no power over the data since the law obliges them to do so. But in practice, effective developments cannot be made without them.
  • Third-party data re-users: companies that offer new services to individuals through the portability of their data. " They are generally not competitors of data holders but rather complementary to their offerings. These services can bring value to individuals' data in many forms: optimizing existing services, offering new personalized services or contributing uses for community needs."
  • Intermediaries: companies that function as subcontractors to individuals. "Whether they are consent managers or personal data warehouses, their function is to technically operationalize the citizen's desire to share their personal data."
"The functioning of self data relies on the agreement between these four types of actors to remove the economic, technical and legal brakes".

According to the study, local authorities can "play a role in the dissemination of this model, while at the same time benefiting from it: strengthening citizens' control over their rights, innovating in the management of the relationship with citizens for better management of the community and public policy objectives. In France, the experiments of the Metropolis of Lyon and the Agglomeration of La Rochelle will test the adoption of self-data services, the sustainability of the model, and the prospects for private actors (data holders and third-party users).

Référence :

Lyon, Nantes and La Rochelle lay the foundations for territorial self data

Références :

In July 2019, the Fing and its partners organized at La Caisse des Dépôts et Consignations, the Self Data Territorial event to explore the privileged links between Self Data and local authorities and to carry out an overview of urban initiatives on the theme of shared personal data.

A guide to implement self data in the territories

The FING published a Territorial Self Data Kit in 2019.

There are:

  • an introduction to Self Data - sharing personal data with the individuals they concern - and the major issues this theme implies for cities;
  • an analysis of the governance models that can be considered for sharing personal data with individuals: personal cloud, direct transfer, "trusted third party" platform, data cooperative, civic data trust
  • a tour of cities and data sharing to get inspired by (or deter from) some examples: Barcelona, Ghent, Toronto,
  • Methodologies to launch the first steps of the implementation of Self Data on a territory: identify personal data, imagine use cases that mobilize them, project towards governance models to embody these use cases and make choices in field experimentation scenarios;
  • advice from these various experiences.

Références :

Sources

Self data, portability, "data altruism", personal cloud: new models of personal data management are being sought

While personal data is currently captured and monetized by platforms without real consent, the control and ability to act of users are at the heart of "self data".

Providing real means of control over personal data: this approach has been the subject of experiments for several years: in the United States (My Data Initiatives), the United Kingdom (midata) or even Finland (MyData Finland). Since 2019, in France, three territories (Nantes, La Rochelle and Greater Lyon) have been experimenting with territorial Self Data.

These alternative models for managing and protecting personal data have been attracting renewed interest in recent months.

  • The right to data portability, established by the European Regulation on the Protection of Personal Data (RGPD), gives users the possibility to recover part of their data in order to store them or transmit them to third parties in order to facilitate their re-use for personal purposes.
  • The Data Governance Act (a draft European regulation currently being prepared) proposes to encourage data sharing by regulating the activities of data sharing service providers in order to guarantee " trust . It also imagines a regime called data altruismfor companies that agree to share their data with non-profit organizations, in order to allow the development of applications of general interest
  • In the report For a public policy on datathe deputy Eric Bothorel recommends "to encourage initiatives of citizen data portability in the service of the general interest, in particular by the organization of campaigns of citizen mobilization".
  • At the end of December, the Banque des Territoires drew up an "inventory of the self data ecosystem".
  • The Fondation Internet Nouvelle Génération (Fing), finally, announces the upcoming drafting of a roadmap for the implementation of Territorial Self Data at the European level.

Towards a "citizen data portability" in the service of the general interest

In the report For a public policy on datasubmitted to the Prime Minister in December 2020, the deputy Eric Bothorel points out the dual nature of the right to data portability, introduced by RGPD. " This right is often presented as a way for users to control and master the use of their data. It is also a tool for economic regulation insofar as it aims to limit the effects of locking customers into a closed ecosystem. Portability is supposed to enable better competition between digital service providers.

The Bothorel mission emphasizes, however, that in Europe, and particularly in France, "several actors have not waited for the implementation of the RGPD to test new ways of sharing personal data, under the control of users . She notes that " local actors, and primarily European cities and metropolises, are often at the forefront of these issues, often ahead of national governments.

The Bothorel mission recommends "encouraging citizen data portability initiatives in the general interest" and mentions three possible ways for the State to intervene:

  • Identify, support and accelerate existing experiments at the local level that aim to give individuals back control over their data and mobilize them in the management of certain territorial policies (energy, mobility, etc.) or for causes of general interest (monitoring travel in times of health crisis).
  • at the national level, organize and promote citizen mobilization campaigns on a limited number of major causes each year in order to show that they can be effective and create a ripple effect;
  • support the emergence and adoption of turnkey technological solutions that enable the right to portability to be put into practice

Référence :

The Banque des Territoires draws up a state of the art of self-data  

In a study which proposes an inventory of the ecosystem of self-data actors, La Banque des Territoires has undertaken " to provide a clear and updated vision of the actors who propose solutions to implement self-data, of the brakes and levers that must be taken into account, and of the initiatives that can serve as an example for launching such a project in turn".

If "the technical and legal bases of such a model exist (...), the diffusion of these tools, practices and methods remains marginal".

  • in the banking sector, legislation had already imposed the portability of personal data: the availability of this data has allowed the creation of new services, the banking aggregators which have more than 4 million users in France
  • in the mobility sector, the centralization of data by the individual in a Personal Mobility Account is particularly suited to the implementation of MaaS and is the subject of experimental work.
  • Other use cases resulting from the portability of personal data are developing: energy coaching services based on the Enédis API, and authentication services based on digital identity (such as telephone number).
"In the absence of available data and sufficient use cases, personal cloud offerings are still struggling to gain traction as a data management infrastructure."

Four types of actors are involved in self data:

  • Individuals: they occupy a central position: " their consent is essential to any data sharing and it is they who select the services that have access to their data. It is also their use of the new services that determines the success of these applications.
  • Data holders: the companies that collect personal data. "In theory, they have no power over the data since the law obliges them to do so. But in practice, effective developments cannot be made without them.
  • Third-party data re-users: companies that offer new services to individuals through the portability of their data. " They are generally not competitors of data holders but rather complementary to their offerings. These services can bring value to individuals' data in many forms: optimizing existing services, offering new personalized services or contributing uses for community needs."
  • Intermediaries: companies that function as subcontractors to individuals. "Whether they are consent managers or personal data warehouses, their function is to technically operationalize the citizen's desire to share their personal data."
"The functioning of self data relies on the agreement between these four types of actors to remove the economic, technical and legal brakes".

According to the study, local authorities can "play a role in the dissemination of this model, while at the same time benefiting from it: strengthening citizens' control over their rights, innovating in the management of the relationship with citizens for better management of the community and public policy objectives. In France, the experiments of the Metropolis of Lyon and the Agglomeration of La Rochelle will test the adoption of self-data services, the sustainability of the model, and the prospects for private actors (data holders and third-party users).

Référence :

Lyon, Nantes and La Rochelle lay the foundations for territorial self data

Références :

In July 2019, the Fing and its partners organized at La Caisse des Dépôts et Consignations, the Self Data Territorial event to explore the privileged links between Self Data and local authorities and to carry out an overview of urban initiatives on the theme of shared personal data.

A guide to implement self data in the territories

The FING published a Territorial Self Data Kit in 2019.

There are:

  • an introduction to Self Data - sharing personal data with the individuals they concern - and the major issues this theme implies for cities;
  • an analysis of the governance models that can be considered for sharing personal data with individuals: personal cloud, direct transfer, "trusted third party" platform, data cooperative, civic data trust
  • a tour of cities and data sharing to get inspired by (or deter from) some examples: Barcelona, Ghent, Toronto,
  • Methodologies to launch the first steps of the implementation of Self Data on a territory: identify personal data, imagine use cases that mobilize them, project towards governance models to embody these use cases and make choices in field experimentation scenarios;
  • advice from these various experiences.

Références :

Sources

Labo Société Numérique

Labo République Française Agence nationale de cohésion des territoires
Self data, portability, "data altruism", personal cloud: new models of personal data management are being sought