Admiral/facebook: privacy row stokes “big data” fears

The motor insurer Admiral became big thanks to “cheesy” TV ads and a strategy of “shaking up the staid world of insurance”, said Kate Burgess in the Financial Times. But a privacy row has left the Cardiff-based group with egg on its face. Last week, Admiral launched a new app for younger drivers, promising to assess their risk – with their permission – using data gleaned from their Facebook pages, including their writing style and their “likes”. The use of exclamation marks, for example, could suggest “overconfidence”, while a propensity for listmaking “might signify a more organised, cautious person”. However, on launch day Facebook “became queasy” and blocked the product, citing privacy concerns.

Social media sites are “vast sources of valuable information just waiting to be plundered”, said Donna Ferguson in The Observer, and this row has sharpened the debate about their use by “nosy insurers”. Data-gathering experts maintain that any “publicly available” info is already fair game for the industry’s algorithms. But there are real worries that the use of such “unrelated data” when making commercial judgements fuels discrimination and bias. Admiral planned to lure young drivers into its scheme by promising discounts to those deemed safer prospects. The cynical will view that as the thin end of the wedge.

The case “illustrates the limits and dangers of big data, big capital and big bureaucracy”, said Christian Fuchs on The Huffington Post. Without safeguards, we risk sleepwalking into a world “dominated by a surveillance-industrial complex”. The moral for boy racers is clear, said Neil Collins in the FT: “Do not use exclamation marks on Facebook!” Facebook’s message to Admiral is clearer still. Hands off: “big data ‘R’ us, not you”.