Hippocratic Computing: Protecting Our Privacy

By Rakesh Agrawal

January 20, 2003

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"It's none of your business." That phrase used to mean something; but increasingly, our private concerns seem to be everybody's business. Nowhere is this more apparent than on the Internet, where we are constantly asked for everything from our ages to our salaries to our shoe sizes in order to sign onto sites or get information from merchants.

Retailers do have a legitimate reason for wanting to know about us. Demographic information enables them to provide goods and services more tailored to our individual needs, and to let us know when something comes up that might match our interests. But for many of us, that's not a compelling enough reason to risk letting personal information get into the wrong hands. As a result, more and more people are supplying Websites with false information—age, address, family size, income, etc.—to avoid being identified in any way.

With research showing that some three-quarters of Internet users don't trust Websites to guard their privacy, it's a safe bet that there's a tremendous amount of phony personal information floating around out there. Some place the misinformation figure at more than 50 percent. Ironically, this can work against the consumers' interests when a business plans future products and services based upon a flood of inaccurate data.

The problem, then, is one of aligning the needs of business against the privacy rights of consumers. For instance, how can companies mine information important to their businesses without learning specific things about us as individuals? And how can a data system be built that we can trust never to divulge such information?

The solution lies in a new approach to data management based upon the principle of "Hippocratic computing." This process takes its name from part of the Oath of Hippocrates sworn to by doctors the world over: "And about whatever I may see or hear in treatment…I will remain silent." The technology is becoming available that will enable businesses to show the same respect for privacy to anyone whose data they collect.

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