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<\/a><\/p>\nAmazon’s new high-tech store opens today<\/a>. It has no check-out and no cashiers. Instead, it relies on the latest visual recognition and internet of things technology to track what you’re taking from the shelves, and bills you automatically. A New York Times report found it very convenient and discovered that shoplifting is hard<\/a>.<\/p>\n The downside is that it’s one step closer to “Big Mother” — a surveillance society that we’ve chosen to be part of. We do this because it’s convenient — but also because we trust that our data is being kept private.<\/p>\n But is that trust warranted? Beyond the many high-profile examples of data breaches and government overreach, surveys show that\u00a0many people just don’t realize how much data is being held about them<\/a> and even Data Scientists can get creeped out\u00a0they\u00a0realize how much even “anonymized” data reveals<\/a>.<\/p>\n A recent survey<\/a> from SAP Hybris showed that customers have high expectations when it comes to vendors using their data. They expect\u00a0them to:<\/p>\n And they will react badly to any problems or abuse: fully 79% said they would leave a retailer if personal data is used without their knowledge.<\/p>\n Digitalization has to be combined with robust protection for customer data. The future lies in the wider adoption of\u00a0customer identity management<\/a> systems that give consumers more explicit control\u00a0over their data — and this is being backed up with stronger data privacy laws such as the European General Data Protection Regulation<\/a>.<\/p>\n As the Amazon example shows, the latest technologies are going to be used to track you in the real world in much the same way as when you’re browsing the internet — and some companies will be tempted to carry out the same kind of abuses.<\/p>\n Are we ready?<\/p>\n<\/a><\/p>\n\n