Elder abuse can come to the forefront when data is tracked on what people do online and then is used to increase advertising opportunities.
There are potential downsides to data collection that worry elder law experts, according to Financial Advisor in “AI, Big Data May Become Tools for Elder Financial Abuse.”
What you do online is potentially tracked and collected by computers that compile a profile of you. It is what is known as big data.
The people behind this data collection want to sell you things. The better profile they can compile of who you are and what you like, the better they can create advertisements that cater to your interests and that are more likely to make you want to buy something.
This data knowledge increases the value of the ad space on the Internet and makes more money for companies selling that space, such as Facebook and Google. In other words, most people find this data collection and tracking to be mostly benign and necessary for popular Internet sites to continue to be free to use.
In the wrong hands, this same data could be used to more effectively target elderly people for financial scams. That has elder law advocates worried, since elder financial abuse is already a serious problem.
Reference: Financial Advisor (March 22, 2017) “AI, Big Data May Become Tools for Elder Financial Abuse.”
