Is there a ‘new future’ for privacy and identity? Time will tell. But with the continuing privacy and identity challenges in Vietnam, the road for secure personal data online for consumers is still hazy.
No one knows what to expect when they surf the internet.
Of course, all your personal details remain painted in the servers of companies that continue to reap big financial rewards by selling their users’ personal data/information to third parties.
The Privacy Challenge
In the present day, one of the significant issues that is at the center of privacy debates is aggregation of personal and private data. This includes how firms make a profit from personal consumer data left on various web and social media sites.
If you surf the internet or do online shopping, you must have come across ads that carry ‘targeted’ advertisements. You may wonder how they learned about your lifestyle or shopping experience. Many company websites track your online activities. Some go to the extent of paying hackers to track and collect your private information online for them.
Privacy is your human right that should not be denied, whatever the cost. Many Vietnamese voice concerns that someone is watching and tracking all their moves online.
Vietnam lacks a clear personal data protection law or robust policies such as the European Union’s General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR). It is challenging for Vietnam to protect consumers or end-users’ data online with laws that are so generalized and inconsistent.
There is an urgent need to create a form of law where firms should collect consumers’ explicit consent before taking their private data and selling it to third parties. Consumers have the right to request their private data be removed from website servers, or else, they should be compensated for the use of their private data.
The case of Toyota Vietnam that suffered data privacy breach of customer’s details is a classic example of the rot in the data protection laws of Vietnam. The Toyota Motor Corporation highlighted this in March 2019 when its servers and its subsidiaries were attacked and accessed by third parties with malicious intent.
Toyota claimed that they were informed about a likelihood of cyber-attacks that targeted its servers in various countries, including Vietnam, where customers’ data were possibly accessed.
This is a clear indication that privacy data protection is a significant problem in Vietnam and other countries with vulnerable security and data protection laws and systems. Many people and firms are profiting from consumer data without their consent. Such data, either stolen or collected from online platforms or websites, are mostly sold to third parties, such as marketing companies for targeted advertising.
The Identity Challenge
The online world has brought about an online identity, characterized by a lot of data and information created daily in almost every online platform, including websites and social media sites. Such data or information holds crucial details about a person, their identity, lifestyle, preferences, and requirements. Online identity also tells a story of how people relate with others.
Many companies, for example, ecommerce firms, are always aggregating end-users data. This is with the sole aim of improving user experience on their platforms or optimizing advertising efforts. This move can be beneficial to end-users or consumers at large; for example, it can help customize their online experiences, such as the personalized services or products they prefer.
However, this can still be detrimental when consumers or end-users lack direct control of their user data. This denies users the power to create an online identity or digital passport that can have been used for other essential purposes, such as substantiating creditworthiness, accessing individualized health care services, or humanitarian aid, especially during global pandemics, such as COVID-19.
With the interconnectedness of digital platforms, states can quickly assess identified persons, predict their individual needs, and employ the right resources to address those needs effectively.
With digital developments, such as digital footprint tracking and mobile telephony, states can generate full profiles based on their citizens’ socio-economic and political preferences. Such data can be integrated into proper planning for disaster and emergency response projects.
The Monetization Challenge
In the modern digital world, users are not aware of the importance of them giving their data away free of charge.
Unfortunately, just as consumers or end-users’ cannot control their data online, they are equally incapable of monetizing it. The proceeds from their private data are taken by third parties and companies that use them for their individual gain.
There is an urgent need for a system based on data technologies designed to address end-users’ personal data rights. This will help to transform the digital ecosystem such that both internet users and the entities that utilize their data are compensated fairly and protected. Whether you choose to click pop-up ads or ignore them altogether, your personal data picked by third parties or stored in web servers should be monetized in a well-designed digital data tracking system.
There is no need to benefit from consumer data only by sheer terms of conditions (T&C) that no one reads to the last word. Almost everyone just clicks ‘accept’ after scrolling to the very bottom without reading any T&C written. This is totally counterproductive and the well-known fact that users do not carefully consider T&Cs is oftentimes taken advantage of by parties wishing to exploit their data for new revenue opportunities.
Every consumer or end-user should be compensated through a transparent digital system that does the math of all the income accrued from consumer’s personal data.
The Bottom-line
It is indeed vital to respect the right to privacy of every consumer. This may not be practically achievable, especially with the privacy, identity, and monetization challenges in Vietnam, however engaging in this discussion is a step in the right direction.
There are a lot of benefits that come with protecting consumer or end-user personal data. This will bring even more social, economic, and political advantages to end-users, companies, and states.
It is far more feasible to monetize consumer data that is protected by full user consent. In fact, user consent not only protects, but ensures that their value is expressly respected. This will also nip in the bud the bedeviling hacking and cyber-attacks of servers to access users’ personal data for malicious intent or individual gain.
Source: Medium, Cpomagazine and Vietnamnet
Author: Yen Le
Yen Le (yen.le@credify.one) is Senior Business Development of Credify Pte. Ltd. – a Singapore based software development company offering Universal Identity and Trust System solutions to e-commerce and financial services companies. For more information on Credify please see: https://credify.one/
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Source: Vietnam Insider