Decode
= "DECODE provides tools that put individuals in control of whether they keep their personal data private or share it for the public good".
URL = https://decodeproject.eu/
Consortium linked to EU research project, with partners including Amsterdam and Barcelona
Description
David Meyer:
"Barcelona's new approach is to "recognise that the citizens are the ones that own the data," Bria said. Along with Amsterdam and a dozen other partners from the worlds of academia, tech and consultancy, the Catalan capital is involved in consortium called Decode that has €5 million worth of funding from the European Commission – and that could end up stimulating genuinely grassroots rivals to Silicon Valley's "sharing economy" platforms.
"The citizen gets to decide what data they want to donate, and on what terms"
"The citizen gets to decide what data they want to donate, and on what terms. Data is not centralised in the hands of very few players," Bria said of Decode's aims. "This is the first step to creating next-generation collaborative economy platforms that are more distributed and sustainable."
The project may also find a way through one of the thorniest issues about the smart city: privacy. Much of the information that powers smart cities is personal data that comes from and can identify individuals, particularly when data from different sources is correlated. If, for example, citizens put sensors in their homes to measure noise levels or air quality, they will first have to get over the fact that these sensors might capture information about them too. So the consortium is considering the use of blockchain technology, together with encryption, to provide a fine-grained permissions system for accessing and controlling data.
"We are implementing Decode so that the citizens can say, 'OK, I only want to share this data with my community, or with the city, because if the city gets this data, they can do something about the noise level', Bria said." (http://www.alphr.com/technology/1006261/how-one-european-smart-city-is-giving-power-back-to-its-citizens)