Big data in China

Chapter 31 Master big data and be the master of the future world! (1)
Facing reality - omnipresent eyes

If you wake up one day and suddenly find that your world is transparent, don’t be surprised, because this is the inevitable development of big data. The exposure of the "Prism Gate" incident has begun to make people realize: there is nothing impossible with data, only you can't think of it.With the penetration of big data technology, not only related industries have flourished, but some organizations and even individuals have ubiquitous eyes.Through these eyes, they can not only see the depth information through the surface information, but also discover the future through the past and present information, and then control the world.

this is the truth.To master big data, you must first face this reality.Big data is not only the "killer mace" of enterprises, but also a "moonlight treasure box" of individuals, as well as a "double-edged sword".From a definition point of view, big data is "the ability to quickly obtain information from a variety of data". What it emphasizes most is not "big", but the diversity of data, the speed of processing and the ability to obtain value. breadth.This also means that when we acquire such value, we will pay corresponding risks.

The Obama administration of the United States raised the big data strategy to the highest national policy of the United States as early as two years ago, believing that big data is "the new oil of the future".Accompanied by this, the U.S. government regards the possession and control of data as another core national capability besides land, sea, and air power.The result: the "Prism Gate" program as part of America's big data strategy.That's why some military experts joked: "The loss of one Snowden is equivalent to the loss of 10 armored divisions of the world's most powerful US military." Because if the data in Snowden's hands is used by other countries , will pose an extremely serious threat to the security of the United States.Data is not only a value product, but also a super weapon that can destroy a country's economy, finance, reputation, and even national cohesion.

In turn, this also means that data is of extreme importance to individuals.Under the gaze of the third eye, there is nowhere to hide personal privacy, and various risks continue to occur.It looks like we don't control the data, but the data controls us.Therefore, governments, enterprises, and individuals must make a clear positioning and understand to what extent or in what way they can use the obtained data, so as to avoid the side effects of a transparent society.

☆The power is everywhere - the holographic lens hanging above our heads

Ordinary people's understanding of big data is a completely unfamiliar state, which seems to be far away, but its power has been fully demonstrated and has penetrated into people's lives.Even in sleep, data is being collected.For example, the electricity usage in your home is recorded by the electricity meter at any time and tracked in real time in the power system; the credit card system is recording your consumption information; the energy company is checking your gas usage; the transportation system is sorting out your violation records.Is there anything else that has been left out?Unless you break away from modern society and go to the deep mountains and old forests to find a cave to live in seclusion, and you don't use bank cards or phones, otherwise you will be located and classified by the data collector.

☆Be wary of endless abuse of personal data

Wherever people go, their "footprints" will be collected, and these personal data will be analyzed. Based on this, the government or businesses can provide high-quality personalized services.This is of course the beauty of big data applications.Although many companies emphasize that the collection, storage, and analysis of data is "anonymous", and that the data will not be disclosed or misused, this may not be the case.

Mr. Mike, a computer expert at Princeton University, expressed his concern on a forum: "The more data available for analysis, the less likely it is to remain anonymous. It only takes a few dozen bytes of information to identify a person." This means that it is an undisclosed fact that personal data is arbitrarily leaked or permissions are provided to more unnecessary parties.

Of course, this requires vigilance. An extremely urgent question we are facing today is: "Am I really willing to accept a world controlled by a data system, even if it is monitoring me 24 hours a day?" Taking care of everything is convenient for people's life and work, and even helps bachelors improve the success rate of blind dates.This is a surprise, but behind it is the "tyranny of data".It observes and records every second, every thought, and every behavior of us, but it is not within our control. This is a real danger that cannot be ignored.

No matter how good things are, they are like double-edged swords, with both good functions and bad side effects. The lessons of Prism are scary enough that no one is safe in the world of data.

Once these data are used by "intentional" people, they will immediately become a bloodless dagger, which may destroy our happy life at any time.

Avoid risk - let the data control everything

In such a "data revolution" involving all people, profound changes are taking place in all walks of life, including our way of thinking.But at the same time, it has also raised concerns about "data tyranny".This is also a question worthy of vigilance, especially for us personally, how to avoid its risks and become the masters of this new world?

No matter how much data there is, massive or unlimited, it still has a limit point, which cannot be reached and cannot be counted.If you completely hand over your fate to data, it will become the tyrant of your fate while quantifying you.The negative effects of doing things entirely based on data are exactly what many big data scholars are worried about today, because data lacks the most precious humanity.Human judgment and the characteristics of human nature cannot be expressed by boring and single data.

For example, an American sci-fi blockbuster "Critical Report" released in 2002 tells the story that in the future technology is so advanced that the police can prevent crimes from happening - through massive information analysis, the suspect is arrested before he commits a crime. crime prevention.As for how to know who is going to commit a crime, it is up to the three people with special functions lying in the pool to decide, and they can capture some key information in time.This is a bit like what is described in the American drama "Suspect Tracker", where data tells us what a person is about to do.

But the truth is, it hasn't happened after all, has it?The greatest feature of human nature is unpredictability--a premeditated crime may end; The experience of the event is not realized by the data, and it cannot be judged.Another tragic example is that the Wall Street stock market once designed a set of trading strategies through complex mathematical logic, but it eventually led to the result of a market crash.American science writer Wright said: "There is always a big difference between scientific data and human data, such as astronomical, meteorological, and infectious disease research data, which are carefully collected and tested by scientists. They are precious data; but for human The research data, as we know about human nature, is variable and reversible, so it is not always reliable."

☆ "Risk management" of data - it is dangerous to put it in one place

When managing data, there is a law to abide by: Putting all the data in one place will take the greatest risk.Just like you put all your money into a bank card, and you often use this card to shop online, and if you don’t provide enough protection for your online banking, your money may disappear at any time fly.Money can't be put in one basket, and neither can data.

For the safety of funds, we should store them separately, rather than betting that one basket is safe enough.For example, some phone numbers cannot be stored in the mobile phone but should be stored in a secret book; ID cards and bank cards should be stored separately instead of in the same drawer.This is good for spreading the risk, and if you have actually encountered a thief, you will understand how important this is.

For enterprises, data security is more important. For example, numerical data can be stored in databases, and unstructured data can be stored in documents or tables for targeted management to diversify the sources of risks.I often see some companies make low-level mistakes. They start to think about security issues after they have done all the work of architecture, design, and development. abdomen.This is a very big mistake. It cannot prevent the occurrence of danger, but can only have the effect of making up for it after the fact.Enterprises should consider data security issues from the beginning to build a secure architecture and strictly protect data.

Building an iron-walled house for data is only one aspect of security. In order to ensure data security, enterprises should also store data slices to achieve more precise control.What is slice storage?That is, only a single employee has access to some data, and only two or more people can view a certain part of the complete data.In this way, even if someone invades the database and steals this part, it is still safe overall, because it is difficult to obtain all the information from a single part, and sometimes it even has no effect at all.Data without context may mean little to a thief, especially when the value density of the data is low.

☆Encryption--eliminate the "toxicity" of data

Toxic data is called "toxic data". This term was proposed by Ferrister, and it is called toxic data, which means that the data in the hands of enterprises will cause huge losses to enterprises or individuals if leaked out.For example, the data collected by telecommunications companies will include the user's call time, location, and movement trajectory, etc.; the data collected by social networking sites will include the user's login password, speech and friend information, etc.; Consumption records or consumption habits, etc., of course, the user's bank password is also included.

In order to reduce the risk of leaking this data, it is especially critical to encrypt it.That is to say, data must be locked in a fully controllable safe to ensure that each of us can become the master of this information, instead of being powerless when it is leaked, allowing it to become a "toxic substance".

Now, the most basic approach in the field of big data is to use transparent data encryption, which means that all captured data is encrypted to ensure that all data has the same high security.While its cost was once high, it has gradually become acceptable to SMEs in recent years.

On the other hand, what would be dire consequences if all of our lives were controlled by data, even your thoughts?Data is now controlling us in both good and bad ways, and it continues to prove that people are more at the mercy of it than we think.

Under its control, how are our lives changing?
1. Unchecked data collection is a serious threat to our privacy and freedom, which is an obvious negative.

2. Data controls everything and exacerbates an already existing risk: people are increasingly relying on data, but it is far less reliable than we think.

When the analysis that relies on the data is not completely reliable, we may be completely limited by the results of the analysis.An erroneous result will not be questioned in any way, and it will even become an authoritative conclusion for a long time, continuing to deepen people's dependence and obsession with data.Ultimately, people may collect data just for the sake of collecting it, or give it a level of trust that it is not entitled to at all.

A manager said: "I can't make decisions without data now. I believe in it like I believe in God. Except for God, anyone must use data to speak in front of me." This is his belief, and it is also Many managers and decision makers abide by the principle, so this sentence often echoes in Wall Street, Zhongguancun, or high-end office buildings in Pudong, Shanghai.In my opinion, they are all working for the data and have become slaves to the data, allowing it to control their soul and thinking.

If things go on like this, the consequences will be disastrous.Finally, how do we avoid this dictatorship and monopoly of data, that is, the dilemma where data dominates everything?How can we talk to it on an equal footing and negotiate flexibly instead of following what it says unconditionally?In my opinion, the only way to get rid of data dictatorship is to establish a sustainable data negotiation system, which means giving the power to analyze and use data to grassroots employees, and let those employees with front-line experience judge whether the source of information Correct, to predict whether the analysis of the data is reasonable.

Just as the generation of big data is due to the division of labor and integration of technology, people who use data should also better divide and collaborate and brainstorm, for example, let a group of data experts trained by advanced technology work together to solve difficult problems, so that these data users Take on more responsibility and avoid data dictatorships.

The conclusion is: we must let the data speak, but the "key" must be in the hands of people.

Overcoming Barriers - Mobility and Accessibility

In the actual application process, the "fluidity" and "availability" of data are an inevitable obstacle, just like the concentration of wealth to the rich, when data becomes more and more valuable (massive assets), Become a chased and monopolized.

On the one hand, people are eager to obtain more data, and on the other hand, they face the obstacle of high-value data being monopolized.

Since the challenges brought by big data are cross-industry and cross-field, the mobility of data between different industries and fields is very important.If data cannot flow smoothly, big data cannot be developed; if data cannot be obtained, big data analysis will lose its premise.

The rise of cloud computing and big data is destined to bring about a revolution in the field of data disclosure. Whether it is for society, companies or individuals, it is a change in the world view of information.This means that data is no longer its own private product that cannot be displayed, but has been integrated into the production method, becoming an asset that can be exchanged or a value-added tool, and has become the key to competition and survival.

(End of this chapter)