With the rise of A.I. and an endless sea of personal data available, some start to question, "How free are we?" Yes, it is true that A.I. will free us from many of the meaningless tasks that we are saddled with on a daily basis. However, there are serious concerns as to how our data is used for both positive and negative reasons.
We continue to see China using nearly every tool imaginable to monitor and control the lives of their citizens. Sesame Credit started just a few years ago but is now becoming mainstream in China. For those of you who are not familiar with the system, it is one where citizens are graded by their actions, things they buy, and other factors such as support of their government's policies. If you have a low credit score, you can be prevented from buying a house, sending your kids to private school, and other actions that restrict your freedom.
Even if the government is not spying on you, corporations surely are. Companies have emerged over the last few years that leverage data and A.I. to predict what you will buy and present to you what they think should be your next purchase. So the next time you order something from Amazon, think about if you purchased with your own free will or due to a massive database combined with a robust, personalized algorithm.
Sesame Credit: a credit-scoring service from Alibaba affiliate Ant Financial, attributes scores to Alipay users who have opted into the program. Users with higher scores are able to access benefits that run the gamut from waivers on car rental deposits to expedited airport security checks.
You might want to ask if they know people in Japan who have worked with AI-driven projects that data mine.
Keep in mind that Amazon is extremely popular in Japan.