Mr. Billy Hawkes:

"Big data" are among those buzzwords where there are large collections of data, whether in the State or the private sector. It is usually mentioned in the context of the capacity to analyse that data. For example, to take the information available from traffic cameras on the flow of cars through a city, one can analyse the data to better figure out where to build new bridges or provide traffic lights. In the case of states, there is the analysis of patterns. An example would be the big data held by the Revenue Commissioners and the Department of Social Protection, the biggest data holders in the State. This operates in analysing patterns of behaviour to detect wrong behaviour, where people might be evading tax in the case of Revenue, or where they might be defrauding the system in the case of the Department of Social Protection. That is what it means in general. Its relevance to data protection is the extent to which there should be a right to access data for other purposes, particularly when it is accessed in a way that is going to harm a person.

Let me give an example. If a person is in receipt of a social welfare payment and, separately, the Department of Social Protection, as it has a right to have, has information from the Private Security Authority that the person concerned has a licence to be a doorman, an inspector may turn up on his or her doorstep and ask why he or she is not working. It would be a fair cop if the person was, in fact, cheating the system. However, if he or she is genuinely unemployed and cannot find a job, one can imagine how he or she might feel. That is the negative side of it. Overall, "big data" is a generic term where there are large databases and there is the capacity to use them for good and evil.