Govt in Tesco-style big data plan

Govt in Tesco-style big data planThe Government is planning to launch a Tesco Clubcard-style data sharing scheme, enabling it share details of earnings, tax records, criminal records, benefits and energy use across the public sector, which could also benefit private sector firms.
The plan, which would require a change in the law the sharing of data across departments, is contained in a discussion document produced by the Cabinet Office Data Sharing Policy Team.
It would link up thousands of state databases maintained by local authorities, schools, police forces and other agencies across the public sector. A few years ago, the Government tried to persuade Tesco to share its Clubcard data, but the plan was rejected.
According to the Daily Telegraph, the ultimate aim of this scheme is to enable departments to apply big data analytic techniques across the various datasets in order to monitor the population more closely.
The Cabinet Office document notes: “People tend to assume that government can share data between departments to complete simple tasks, and are surprised to learn that it cannot.
“Removing barriers to sharing or linking datasets can help government to design and implement evidence-based policy – for example to tackle social mobility, assist economic growth and prevent crime.”
The data will be anonymised, but there are also plans to sell it to any organisations providing public services.
It adds that [the plan would] “improve energy efficiency by matching people’s gas and electricity use with information about their property held by the Land Registry” or to identify elderly people at risk from cold weather in the winter.

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1 Comment on "Govt in Tesco-style big data plan"

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