South by Southwest (“SXSW”) Interactive kicked off last week, and Covington was there to cover privacy and big data’s big buzz, a topic which dominated much of the conference.  Among the events that took place last Friday were “Big Data Inverted: The Best Candy from Strangers?” and “Privacy Under the Covers: The Naked Truth.”  The big-data panel included Chris Colborn, R/GA Global Chief Experience Officer; Dinkar Jain, Google Product Manager; and Maria Bezaitis, Principal Engineer at Intel.  The privacy event was a “Core Conversation” that featured MeMe Jacobs Rasmussen, Adobe’s Chief Privacy Officer, VP, and Associate General Counsel; and Shaina Boone, SVP of Marketing Science at Critical Mass.

Big Data Inverted started with the premise that, as big data transforms relationships and information sharing, “people are beginning to unintentionally ‘barricade’ themselves from new experiences.”  While much of the discussion focused on how businesses can structure their models to leverage big data so that it is useful and relevant, better connected, and more available, privacy and consumer trust necessarily came up throughout the discussion.  In particular, many focused on the two sides of the big data coin:  potential and privacy.  Businesses stand to benefit if they can tame and harness big data, but not if they ignore privacy concerns inherent in amassing huge quantities of sensitive information.  Many are suggesting, however, that businesses can profit from privacy too — that is, because privacy has become so important to consumers, it can be used competitively.Continue Reading Covington at #SXSW: If “Big Data Is the New Oil” Then “Privacy Is the New Green”