Data Marketplaces: A Solution for Personal Data Control and Ownership?

Data sharing is critical for advancing research, commercializing technologies, and informing people. However, data owners have been reluctant to share data due to concerns about data control, access, and a lack of secure data storage solutions. Frequent data breaches have also led to a lack of user trust in businesses. Despite widespread recognition of user concerns, few steps have been taken to empower users. While there are models for decentralized data sharing, the question of how to incentivize these structures to enable data sharing at scale is largely unexplored. This work discusses the potential of blockchain-based data marketplaces to empower users by giving them more control over their data and bringing transparency to the data-driven ecosystem.