Economist Richard Thaler wrote an op-ed in the New York Times back in April 2011 with a straightforward recommendation — companies that collect data on people should be required to share that data with their customers,
Here is a guiding principle: If a business collects data on consumers electronically, it should provide them with a version of that data that is easy to download and export to another Web site. Think of it this way: you have lent the company your data, and you’d like a copy for your own use.
. . .
Under my proposed rule, your cellphone provider would give you access to a file that includes all the information it has collected on you since you owned the phone, as well as the current fees for each kind of service you use. The data would be in a format that is usable by app designers, so new services could be created to provide practical advice to consumers. (Think Expedia for calling plans.) And this virtuous cycle would create jobs for the people who dream up and run these new Web sites.
Do most cell phone companies not already do this? Maybe I just lucked on on cell phone companies, but each month T Mobile makes it trivial to download CSV files showing all of my phone calls, text messages, data usage, and added services purchased (mostly Android apps in my case). I just assumed this was an obvious feature that was likely to be fairly common in the cell phone business (TMobile doesn’t do this out of altruism or desire to share, of course, but rather because it doesn’t want to pay to mail me a printed bill).
In general, I think Thaler’s idea is very good — more companies should do that voluntarily without needing the stick of governmental regulation.
One potential issue, however, is going to be data formats. For example, my credit union offers to let me download files with my data, but they unhelpfully give me the choice of downloading the data in either Intuit Quicken or Microsoft Money formats. Since I don’t use either of those programs, I need to go out and grab a program to convert the downloaded file to CSV. At a minimum, all data exports should be available in an open format like CSV.