Big Data needs to ‘clean’ up its act

Jer Thorp, formerly data artist in residence’ at The New York Times and co-founder of The Office for Creative Research, says a growing number of investors and businesses think Big Data could be the new oil’.

But speaking yesterday at CLSA’s annual investor conference in Hong Kong, Thorp warned of the underlying ethical dangers and how data companies which failed to heed them might wither in the long run.

Thorp drew the parallel with oil accompanied by an image of the JR Ewing -- the decidedly unethical oil magnate played by the late Larry Hagman in the blockbuster 1980s TV series “Dallas”.