Article: The Data That Turned the World Upside Down

Article: The Data That Turned the World Upside Down

The long read:

Welcome to Dystopia

“Anyone who has not spent the last five years living on another planet will be familiar with the term Big Data. Big Data means, in essence, that everything we do, both on and offline, leaves digital traces. Every purchase we make with our cards, every search we type into Google, every movement we make when our mobile phone is in our pocket, every “like” is stored. Especially every “like.” For a long time, it was not entirely clear what use this data could have—except, perhaps, that we might find ads for high blood pressure remedies just after we’ve Googled “reduce blood pressure.” ”

It turns out that all the data that is constantly being collected from everyone who uses a smartphone/watch, tablet or computer is finally put to use – by the bad guys.
Psychometrics is a data-driven sub-branch of psychology that makes it possible to analyze your personality by looking at your facebook-likes and comparing them to other users personalities who have liked the same pages. (You can let a psychometric system called OCEAN analyze you by going to this site here) Michal Kosinski, the creator of this method, knows he opened the Pandora’s box.
There are companies who specialize in collecting data, creating profiles and directing campaign advertising that is directly aimed at them personally as an individual. This sounds crazy, but it is the truth. They know how to influence the people who are easy to influence and this tactic was used in the swing states during the last presidential elections – which mostly turned out to favor Trump over Clinton.

Is this the end of democracy?
One of the main pillars of modern global society, democracy, is crumbling. Votes can be changed by influencing one party – the party who pays more. So the richer the party/candidate, the higher his chances to succeed. Two impossible votes got through by telling the right/wrong people the right/wrong things.
The Big Data company Cambridge Analytica worked for the Brexit as well as for Trump – both of which we thought would never make it through – and both of which shocked us when they did.

http://motherboard.vice.com/read/big-data-cambridge-analytica-brexit-trump