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The Difficulty In Getting a Machine To Forget Anything

Posted by timothy on from the if-it-can-be-seen-it-can-be-copied dept.

An anonymous reader writes: When personal information ends up in the analytical whirlpool of big data, it almost inevitably becomes orphaned from any permissions framework that the discloser granted for its original use; machine learning systems, commercial and otherwise, end up deriving properties and models from the data until the replication, duplication and derivation of that data can never hoped to be controlled or 'called back' by the originator. But researchers now propose a revision which can be imposed upon existing machine-learning frameworks, interposing a 'summation' layer between user data and the learning system, effectively tokenising the information without anonymising it, and providing an auditable path whereby withdrawal of the user information would ripple through all iterations of systems which have utilized it — genuine 'cancellation' of data.

6 of 79 comments (clear)

  1. Or by penguinoid · · Score: 5, Insightful

    Or, you could "accidentally" keep the data, and sell it.

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    Don't waste your vote! Vote for whoever you want, unless you live in a swing state it won't matter anyways
  2. How about if we OWN our personal information? by elwinc · · Score: 5, Interesting

    Imagine if we owned our personal information as a form of intellectual property? Big corporations have gotten pretty good at protecting their intellectual property rights. Maybe it's time for us ordinary folks to own our personal information. Then we could license it to companies for particular uses, but they wouldn't have the right to sell it without our permission.

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    --- Often in error; never in doubt!
    1. Re:How about if we OWN our personal information? by jellomizer · · Score: 3, Interesting

      We do Own our personal information, but we usually sell it in trade of the electronic services you want to use.

      You find there is value in Google Internet searching, then your payment is knowing your searches would be part of google marketing,

      There is that news website that you don't want to pay for, well those adds will pay for the services.

      You don't need to use these consumer services on the internet. So you can keep your personal information to yourself.

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      If something is so important that you feel the need to post it on the internet... It probably isn't that important.
  3. I made a copy ... by PPH · · Score: 3, Insightful

    ... of the database on archival optical media. What now?

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    Have gnu, will travel.
  4. Good luck with that ... by gstoddart · · Score: 5, Insightful

    Without laws enforcing it, even if you had a mechanism none of those corporations would follow it.

    They seem to think it is their right to buy and sell our information.

    Even if you had laws enforcing it, I bet half of them would lie and keep it anyway. The shady assholes feeding the "big data" industry have far too much money at stake to ever allow constraints on how they use "our" data.

    They'd just pay off the politicians to pass laws clarifying it's their data, they're entitled to it, and we don't get a vote.

    Just like always.

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    Lost at C:>. Found at C.
  5. I actually prefer non-revokability... by pla · · Score: 3, Insightful

    TFA doesn't really deal with the problem of deleting personally identifiable information, so much as aggregate statistics derived from personal data.

    And in that context, I far, far prefer that they can't remove my contribution from their aggregates (although I do opt out of personalized collection whenever possible).

    Why, you might ask? Simple - I lie to companies that ask me for information. A lot. I do my damnedest to poison their databases to the greatest extent possible. Now why on Earth would I want to make it easy for them to redact the "facts" that I own a Veryron and a solid gold iWatch despite living in a cardboard box beneath a highway overpass?

    Sometimes, the box of chocolates has Ex-Lax in it.