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> Imagine if the wealth of data collected about you all went to one place, and, most importantly, was controlled by you. Imagine if Company X had to pay you to

by graue 13y ago

> Imagine if the wealth of data collected about you all went to one place, and, most importantly, was controlled by you. Imagine if Company X had to pay you to know about your Amazon spending habits instead of paying Amazon. Even more than Project VRM linked above, this is precisely the eventual goal of Tent: https://tent.io/ https://tent.io/ That said, I'm skeptical of these projects', or anyone's, ability to achieve this utopia. Why would Amazon or Google adopt such a system? Your shopping/searching history is valuable data that gives them a business advantage. Also, while a personal data store that you control may be a geek's wet dream, for an average nontechnical person, it would likely be difficult to use, insecure and offer no clear benefits. And if it ends up just a toy for geeks, the lack of scale would make it even harder to do anything interesting with it or get any companies of significant size to play ball. I do hope ideas like this surface in some form, but I'm skeptical of the personal data store ever really becoming a thing.

abraininavat 13y ago
Why would Amazon or Google adopt such a system I could imagine laws requiring that personal data be controlled by the subjects. it would likely be difficult to use, insecure... Who says? How can you assume this? and offer no clear benefits Some would consider the ability to keep your information private at will a benefit. Others would consider the ability to sell said information a benefit. the lack of scale would make it even harder to do anything interesting Lack of scale? An individual's data would be controlled by that individual, but the system would scale across all of humanity. I don't think you're thinking big enough -- I'm not talking about each person running his personal EC2.
- graue 13y ago
  Look, I'm not saying don't go for this idea. I'd love to see you try it. My doubts shouldn't get in your way. Code it up. As for why it would be difficult to use and insecure? I'm guessing most of the people you hang out with are probably geeks. For perspective, take a look at this video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=o4MwTvtyrUQ https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=o4MwTvtyrUQ Imagine each one of those people in the video has a personal data store that contains their complete medical history, right alongside all their Google searches, Amazon purchases and tweets. How secure of a password do you think they picked? How hard would it be to trick them with a phishing attack? How much do you think they even know how to do with it in the first place?
  - amirmc 13y ago
    The questions you pose also apply to centralized services in exactly the same way. There is no reason that personal clouds would be any less secure than centralized services are today. [1] Even though some people are confused about the difference between browsers and search-engines doesn't mean they don't know how to use either. You'd probably have got the same response if you'd asked about the difference between the Web and Internet. Or any other complex system they don't have deal with day-to-day (internal combustion engine, electricity transmission, etc) [1] edit: think of things like mass-assignment issue with rails and github or the recent facebook exploit that was posted. Centralized services are just as much of a honey-pot as a personal cloud might be.
    - graue 13y ago
      No one who steals your Facebook password can get into anything as serious as your entire medical history. The proposal is dangerous precisely because it's centralized — in the sense of centralizing all different types of data on a particular individual. It also, as a side effect of giving the user more control, would give the user more to lose if their account is compromised. Again, with no clear gain for most people.
      - amirmc 13y ago
        I feel we're just going to disagree over this but it's probably because neither of us has clearly stated the threat models we're dealing with. Also, it's somewhat hyperbolic to claim that such proposals are 'dangerous'. I could claim the same about the current situation where more and more personal data is handed over to companies, almost by default.

by graue 13y ago

abraininavat 13y ago

Why would Amazon or Google adopt such a system I could imagine laws requiring that personal data be controlled by the subjects. it would likely be difficult to use, insecure... Who says? How can you assume this? and offer no clear benefits Some would consider the ability to keep your information private at will a benefit. Others would consider the ability to sell said information a benefit. the lack of scale would make it even harder to do anything interesting Lack of scale? An individual's data would be controlled by that individual, but the system would scale across all of humanity. I don't think you're thinking big enough -- I'm not talking about each person running his personal EC2.

graue 13y ago
Look, I'm not saying don't go for this idea. I'd love to see you try it. My doubts shouldn't get in your way. Code it up. As for why it would be difficult to use and insecure? I'm guessing most of the people you hang out with are probably geeks. For perspective, take a look at this video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=o4MwTvtyrUQ https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=o4MwTvtyrUQ Imagine each one of those people in the video has a personal data store that contains their complete medical history, right alongside all their Google searches, Amazon purchases and tweets. How secure of a password do you think they picked? How hard would it be to trick them with a phishing attack? How much do you think they even know how to do with it in the first place?
- amirmc 13y ago
  The questions you pose also apply to centralized services in exactly the same way. There is no reason that personal clouds would be any less secure than centralized services are today. [1] Even though some people are confused about the difference between browsers and search-engines doesn't mean they don't know how to use either. You'd probably have got the same response if you'd asked about the difference between the Web and Internet. Or any other complex system they don't have deal with day-to-day (internal combustion engine, electricity transmission, etc) [1] edit: think of things like mass-assignment issue with rails and github or the recent facebook exploit that was posted. Centralized services are just as much of a honey-pot as a personal cloud might be.
  - graue 13y ago
    No one who steals your Facebook password can get into anything as serious as your entire medical history. The proposal is dangerous precisely because it's centralized — in the sense of centralizing all different types of data on a particular individual. It also, as a side effect of giving the user more control, would give the user more to lose if their account is compromised. Again, with no clear gain for most people.
    - amirmc 13y ago
      I feel we're just going to disagree over this but it's probably because neither of us has clearly stated the threat models we're dealing with. Also, it's somewhat hyperbolic to claim that such proposals are 'dangerous'. I could claim the same about the current situation where more and more personal data is handed over to companies, almost by default.