Not so long ago, a great many of us were quite happy to hand over our personal information, without much thought, in return for handy online services that enables millions of us to keep in touch with friends and family.
But then came the Cambridge Analytica scandal, which saw 50 million Facebook profiles harvested for the company in a major data breach.
Consequently, people became aware of the data they were giving away, many not even realising they were doing it. Shortly thereafter the EU General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) came into force, and more recently, California passed a landmark privacy bill, the California Consumer Privacy Act[1], designed to provide protections to the state’s 40 million residents in light of major privacy breaches.
These, however, are just a few of the measures being taken to ensure that citizens have more control over their personal data. More, though, needs to be done.
For one Chinese-based company they believe they have the answer. GXChain[2] is a public blockchain that delivers decentralised data exchange solutions.
It is aiming to change the data exchange ecosystem by giving users back control of their personal data. According to the platform, it obtains user consent before collecting and storing user data on a blockchain. This information is managed by a private key, which is securely generated and handed over to users, giving them full control of their data.
For those who want to earn rewards they are incentivised with GXS tokens if they share their data. The more information that is authorised to be shared, the more tokens they receive. They are achieving this through Blockcity, a mobile app that rewards users to cultivate marketable data. Built by GXChain, Blockcity is the largest and most active blockchain community in China, according to Yunpeng Ding,
