Limitations of predictive analytics

With big data analytics and machine learning technologies it is becoming possible to very accurately predict trends and patterns in many areas but also in regards to human behaviour. So far this has been applied in most part to retail market and online shopping.

There has been discussions of future systems that while technologically possible are controversial. Crime prediction. Big data and even real time big data analytics combined with machine learning technology can be very accurate. This could possibly palce authorities in advantaged position in order to prevent crime by for example dispatching appropriate resources to an area with high risk potential in real time.

Discussions also tend to steer into more of a science fiction scenarios taken from movies like Minority Report where police uses technology to predict crime and make arrests based on that prediction.

Obvious controversy is in human belief in destiny and predefined path, but this could also be a discussion about religion. there will always be pros and cons, believers and non believers. Its a free will problem and I believe that human beings should never be judged on an assumption or a prediction.

Theoretically there could be benefits of preventing crime from happening and while technologically possible I believe that scenario should be left in the entertainment industry in the hands of movie makers.

Implications of big data for individuals

Implications of big data analytics are a constant topic of a debate. There are many ways that individuals can be affected. The positive implications can greatly improve a life of an individual.

Those include an idea of driver-less cars that utilise real time big data analytics.

Car journeys could become:

• safer due to elimination of a human error
• faster due to big data real time traffic analysis
• more efficient and economical due to big data route, traffic and even optimisation for the most economic driving style

Another positive implication of utilisation of big data for individuals lays in healthcare. With previously mentioned examples of ability to considerably cut diagnosis time as well costs. Use of dedicated healthcare smart wearable devices could mean early detection of health problems for individuals even before symptoms occur which could potentially have life saving implications. Healthcare is an area where bid data can make an impact which could include:

• Extension of life
• Early health problem detection
• Diagnosis time reduced
• Reduced costs of diagnosis
• Ability to treat more patients due to time saved

While there are many more benefits of how big data analytics can affect and individuals life there are many negative effects that I think we need to be aware of. Big data analytics brings more automation to almost every sector that it is applied to. It comes with territory.

First example of possible negative implications is something that is already happening and more and more companies are starting to use automated profiling of prospective employees. This could greatly reduce chances of employment even for individuals with the right skills and expertise solely due to being less skilled / technical about formatting their resumes to a specific formats that an algorithm will be able to “read” or “understand”.

Similar automated profiling techniques can cause individuals not the be awarded place at educational establishments or being regarded as inadequate students during their time at university solely due to inner workings of an algorithm used to asses the entry applications or academic progress.

In line with the above techniques and their implications there may be a fear of loss of personal liberty where choices are made for an individual and solely up to inner workings of algorithms that asses and analyse data.

Negative implications include:

• Profiling of job applicants,
• Profiling of students,
• Profiling of credit applicants
• Loss of personal liberty
• Loss of privacy

Implications of big data for society

Implications of big data analytics for society can overlap with previously mentioned implications for individuals.

Main positive implications include:

• Great improvement in healthcare

With great potential of reducing diagnosis time and effectively its cost there can be less drain on healthcare secedes. This could enable faster and more effective appointment systems. Patients with rare ore more complicated conditions could be seen by specialists much sooner.

Extension of life could also be possible due to faster diagnosis ans well a increased rate of early health problems detection could lead to life saved.

Use of big data analytics in healthcare can have a positive economical effect for the society where costs of diagnosis were saved.

• Near instant court decisions for crime sentencing

While controversial, another possible positive implication of use of big data analytics are arguably near instant court decisions for crime sentencing based on hard facts and eliminating factors like bias or likeability .

Cutting time and effectively costs of court time could have a positive impact on economy for the benefit of the society.

This example is widely debated and controversial and I will also present an opposed view in a negative implications of that particular use of big data analytics.

Main negative implications include:

• Potential loss of jobs

Most discussed and debated implication of big data analytics (or progress technological progress in general) for the society were always topics of job loss and replacement of manual labour with automated systems or robots.

While not that long ago this may have been a chapter from William Gibson’s science fiction book it poses a real life implications today for low skilled jobs in certain industries that could affect teachers, nurses or any kind of manual labour jobs.

Topic of job loss due to advancement technology is not new. It was widely debated during each major technological advancement and there are always two sides to the medal.

Some argue that technolog is not at fault here but the problem lies in how our current societies and governmental systems are structured.

A quote from New York congressional representative Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez shine some light on that side that is usually left out from the debate:

“We should not be haunted by the specter of being automated out of work,” “We should be excited by that. But the reason we’re not excited by it is because we live in a society where if you don’t have a job, you are left to die. And that is, at its core, our problem.”

Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (2019)

• Human rights implications – mass surveillance

To power data driven services from driver-less cars, traffic automation to life saving medical wearable devices a massive about of dat needs to be collected on daily basis. To enable the above debated scenarios and technologies to benefit individuals and the society more data gathering deceives and technologies need to be deployed.

This comes at cost to personal privacy and can have human rights implications.

A laud case of Edward Snowden, a former Central Intelligence Agency employee who with help of professional journalists disclosed use of mass surveillance technologies by the government agency on unsuspecting citizens.

With large percent of our lives shifting into the online space and sharing data and information on each one of us this can be possible cost to the benefits we gain or a scary scenario where personal privacy is abolished heavily implicating human rights and affecting whole societies.

• Near instant court decisions for crime sentencing – counterargument

There is also a counter argument for use of big data analytics in the workings of court proceedings and criminal sentencing. The argument being that basing the sentencing solely on data analytics does not take a human factor and most importantly the context which often needs to be assessed on case by case basis due to often unique nature of each case and its circumstances.

Strategies for limiting the negative effects of big data

• Creation of rules and laws
• Enforcement
• Opt Out – data sharing
• Misinformation

With big data analytics the privacy of individuals comes very close to being non existent. With that said and the previously mentioned negative effects on society and individuals there are many ways to limit or in some cases eliminate those negative effects.

In the public and official sectors like councils or banking where data must be accurate the only way to limit the negative effects for an individual is creation and enforcement of new rules and laws that would protect an individual from being exploited.

As an individual we also have few limited choices. In many cases we can op out from online data sharing and most of institution are already obliged to clearly state how our personal data is handled.

In regards to already mentioned possible surveillance and protection of individual privacy there are ways to use the same technologies in counteract. This method was known for hundreds of years and it is misinformation.

There could be a market for those privacy-conscious for an applications which would constantly generate and share randomly generated data (for example search queries) from our devices. This in turn would hide our actual online presence in plain sight effectively rending big data’s Veracity useless every time.