Profusion CEO Mike Weston has written a WSJ article which tries to think ahead of the problems that will arrive when cities have been smartened up. The main issue he examines is marketers purchasing information to target citizens with products. Weston suggests we can tackle the issue with stringent legislation and/or business ethics, but I wonder if those tactics will work. The legislative approach will, at best, be a leaky boat, as it’s likely that this type of information wants to be free–as in liberated. Laws will always likely trail the technology. Expecting businesses to be constrained by a code that runs counter to the bottom line seems unlikely. But it’s good people devoted to data science like Weston are thinking in advance of these developments, and his piece is well worth reading. An excerpt:

By analyzing this information using data-science techniques, a company could learn not only the day-to-day routine of an individual but also his preferences, behavior and emotional state. Private companies could know more about people than they know about themselves.

For marketers, this is a dream come true. Imagine the scenario: A beverage company knows a particular individual’s Friday or Saturday night routine. The company knows what he drinks, when he drinks, who he drinks with and where he goes. It also knows how the weather affects what beverage the individual chooses and how changes in work patterns influence how much alcohol he consumes. By combining this information with the individual’s social-media profile, the company could send marketing messages to the person when he is most susceptible to the suggestion to buy a drink.

Businesses could market divorce services to couples who, through data analysis, are shown to exhibit behavior that indicates that their relationship could be in trouble—things like unusual travel patterns, and changes in work-life balance, such as a rapid increase in the amount of time both individuals spend at work or in separate bars. Individuals who are shown to lead very unhealthy lifestyles could be deliberately targeted by brands selling fatty foods.

The scenarios are endless, ranging from the genuinely useful to the potentially terrifying. But what will moderate how a smart city works and how brands can use data?•

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A pre-Internet attempt at a smart city, The Woodlands, 1977.