There is No Such Thing as ‘Anonymised’ Data

The ID and secure document industry goes to great lengths to keep secure the personally identifiable information (PII) that we gather, as we are keenly aware of the injurious consequences of ID data breeches. But there are other ways to build an identity, as an article on the digital privacy platform EFF demonstrates.

Paige Collings’ article starts from the premise that each credit card purchase, personal medical diagnosis, border crossing, touch point with government and preference about music and books is recorded and then used to predict what we like and dislike, and – ultimately – who we are.

This often happens without our knowledge or consent. Personal information that corporations collect from our online behaviours sells for profit and incentivises online actors to collect as much data about us as possible.