How Can Data Be Responsibly Shared?

<B>How Can Data Be Responsibly Shared?</B>

The practice of sharing data with suppliers raises questions that have been simmering within the travel industry. No question is as controversial as who owns the data. Data sharing is essential within many industries. Pharmaceutical companies, for example, lead the way using third-party aggregators to determine market share use of drug products. Prescription use, among the most personal of information, is aggregated to measure share. Pharmaceutical companies mask the data to protect patient privacy. Does the patient own their health data?

In the travel industry, an air transaction, similarly is difficult. An airline ticket comprises data from many sources: public fares registered with ATPCO and schedules from OAG; private fares and traveler profiles stored within the global distribution system; and third-party information created as a byproduct of agency, credit card and Airlines Reporting Corp. processing. Does any one party "own" the data? Or does each party retain their ownership of the data they produced? Either case is hardly tenable.

Travel managers have asserted that their companies own the data. Reality only sinks in when they change agencies and their old agency refuses to hand off the data. A company has little recourse unless there is a contractual commitment to provide data to the customer.

ARC has the data, but, at this time, is prohibited from providing it to non-ARC members. Airlines have long purchased MIDT transaction data, but they are prohibited from transferring it to non-International Air Transport Association members. Credit card companies have data, but it lacks reliable detail required for many travel management activities. Agents have traveler profile data that they may or may not transfer to their corporate clients.

And so each of us are holding our piece of the proverbial elephant, asserting that the data are ours, seeking marginal competitive advantage, while needing each other's data to create complete and useful information. No one has a monopoly on perfect information. To attain the best information, we are dependent upon each other.

The question then is not who owns the data but how data can be responsibly shared? Once we acknowledge our interdependence, principles can be established for the proper handling of the data. While all of us may be in possession of data to serve our role in the distribution channel, we are stewards of the data. It is our responsibility to safeguard the data by meeting eight principles:

1) The privacy of the individual must be protected. Personal data is a byproduct of our travelers completing their business missions. It should not be a vehicle to intrude on their personal lives. Laws respecting personal data privacy must be upheld.

2) As stewards of our customer's data, it is our collective responsibility to protect and safeguard these data. As we receive data from one source and pass it to another, it is our duty to ensure that we do so without damaging the data.

3) Customers have a right to their data. Simply put, the customer should have the right to require any party, be it GDS, agency, credit card company, airline or ARC, to furnish them with their data.

4) Data are provided by the customer for a specific use. This use should be acknowledged and where the customer limits use, those limits must be respected.

5) Benchmarking and data mining, without the customer's explicit permission, is an unauthorized use of the data; this violates their trust.

6) Data should not be resold to any other third-party without the customer's permission. This includes individual data, as well as data provided in aggregate.

7) Confidential data must be respected and protected. These data should be masked or encrypted to protect the interests of any other party, but confidentiality must not be falsely invoked to inhibit the customer's use.

8) Companies have the right and responsibility to contract with the parties that hold their data to protect and limit its use.

Good data benefits us all. Informed decisions can be made, contractual arrangements honored and business can operate more effectively. It is a mistake to take this remarkable industry for granted. While it appears contentious and robust, it is also a fragile network dependent on trust and the exchange of data. By establishing principles for safeguarding data, we safeguard the industry itself.


<I>Michael Whitesage is president of Prism Group Inc. of Albuquerque, N.M.