Given the amount of data that we post about ourselves online – on Facebook, on Twitter, Tumblr, blogs, etc, the dataset that effectively describes you as an individual continually grows. With some clever analytics and sufficiently large sample size, trends can be inferred with alarming reliability and predictions about individual behaviour can be made with a frankly scary degree of accuracy.
Jennifer Golbeck describes how scientists, governments and companies make use of this data to profile individuals and build a comprehensive picture of you based on seemingly unconnected events, actions and trends. ...