Study Investigates How Valuable We Consider Our Mobile Data [VIDEO]

 By 
Sonia Paul
 on 
Study Investigates How Valuable We Consider Our Mobile Data [VIDEO]

[brightcove video="1565366680001" /]

Have you ever thought about the privacy concerns associated with smartphone apps?

Researchers at Queen Mary University in London certainly have. They're starting a new project aimed at finding out just how valuable we consider our personal information.

The study asks volunteers to download a free Android app, which feeds users basic questions, such as "How are you doing?," "Where are you?" and "Who are you with?" every day for two weeks.

They think these answers will mimic the sort of information data companies are mining from our phones.

Though feeding an app personal information seems counter-intuitive, Dr. Bernadette Kamleitner, one of the project's leads, says it's the best way to test our own concerns.

"Personal information is a huge and poorly regulated business," she says. "Although consumers can benefit from the use of their information by receiving customized offers, others also use individual’s data to make money. We hope this project will help us to understand which information people consider more or less valuable to them, and will allow us to show whether people genuinely believe that 'personal information has no price.'"

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