Canopy provides a blueprint for privacy-focused content recommendations

With the advent of cloud computing, e-commerce, and social media, it's difficult to keep tabs on who has access to our data, and harder still to know how much care they're taking with it -- barely a day goes by without some form of data-breach, lapse, or privacy scandal coming to the fore. But what constitutes "data-misuse" is covered by a broad gamut of scenarios that reach beyond poor security hygiene. Online tracking and profiling is rife -- it turns out there is a heap of money to be made from knowing where you are, what you do, and what you like. It all comes down to personalization: selling things, be it products, playlists, or a political ideology, based on who you are. The Facebook and Cambridge Analytical, which highlighted how social networks armed with vast banks of personal data could be leveraged to profile voters and micro-target with personalized political ads, was something of a watershed moment in terms of elevating the issue of data-privacy and abuse into the public consciousness.