GetYourData.org is a website that makes it simple for citizens to get a copy of their personal data from companies and the government. The project aims to create a platform that can be used in several European countries.
Citizens of the European Union have a legal right to request a copy of the information and data about them that is held by organisations. For instance in Finland, this right is defined in Henkilötietolaki (for explanation of right see here).
In some European countries, access requests are established practice. The UK, for instance, sees around a million of them annually. Still, many people don't exercise this right because the process of making personal data request can be complicated. One has to know how to craft the right text for the request, find contact details, manage correspondence, and do this without knowledge of previous experiences in dealing with particular organisations. A digital tool for making data requests can make them more accessible and usable for a wider range of purposes.
The type of data that can be accessed through requests include insurance and credit profiles, tax and medical records, list of transactions with companies, and the list of information used in bureacratic decisions Making this information easier to reach for citizens can have a number of benefits. The service will help people ensure institutions have made decisions that affect them on the right grounds, answer to concerns about privacy, and make it easier for people to collect the documentation they need (for instance when applying for residence permits). Ultimately the service may also be part of an ecosystem of personal data management, in which individuals can manage and reuse data about themselves.
For the Finnish context the site will be run by Open Knowledge Finland ry. The project group has also participants in the United Kingdom and France that will run local versions of the project.
The first version of the service is being developed during the summer and autumn in 2016, and is user tested in Finland. The service is likely to be publicly available later in the year.
The test site is available at the address http://okffi-dev1.kapsi.fi/en/
The code for the service is published under open source license (MIT License), and is available at https://github.com/sakset/getyourdata.
GetYourData.org is being developed by a group of people based in Finland, the UK and France. The students joining the project would work most closely with people in Finland, who are associated with Open Knowledge Finland. The team on the client’s side has the following expertise:
Anssi Mikola: Project coordination
Antti Poikola: Project coordination, legal & MyData knowledge
Aleksi Knuutila: Back-end development and project management
Marion Blatter: User experience
Maxime Cordier: Data protection law
Open Knowledge Finland is a registered not-for-profit association and part of the wider international Open Knowledge -network. We promote opening and usage of open knowledge and advance development of open society in Finland. The association was founded in 2012 and has more than 300 members who present widely the Finnish ‘open’ -scene including individuals, companies and other organizations. OKFFI is also a wide network of people and projects related to open knowledge. You don’t have to be member of the association in order to participate in the activities of the network.
Name: Anssi Mikola
E-mail: [email protected]
Telephone: +358 400 453612
Address: Caloniuksenkatu 9D,
Name: Aleksi Knuutila
E-mail: [email protected]
Telephone: +44 7563089587