IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/p/hal/journl/hal-01557755.html
   My bibliography  Save this paper

The economics of privacy

Author

Listed:
  • Grazia Cecere

    (IMT-BS - DEFI - Département Droit, Economie et Finances - TEM - Télécom Ecole de Management - IMT - Institut Mines-Télécom [Paris] - IMT-BS - Institut Mines-Télécom Business School - IMT - Institut Mines-Télécom [Paris], RITM - Réseaux Innovation Territoires et Mondialisation - UP11 - Université Paris-Sud - Paris 11, LITEM - Laboratoire en Innovation, Technologies, Economie et Management (EA 7363) - UEVE - Université d'Évry-Val-d'Essonne - TEM - Télécom Ecole de Management)

  • Fabrice Le Guel

    (RITM - Réseaux Innovation Territoires et Mondialisation - UP11 - Université Paris-Sud - Paris 11)

  • Matthieu Manant

    (RITM - Réseaux Innovation Territoires et Mondialisation - UP11 - Université Paris-Sud - Paris 11)

  • Nicolas Soulié

    (RITM - Réseaux Innovation Territoires et Mondialisation - UP11 - Université Paris-Sud - Paris 11)

Abstract

The increasing digitalization of the economy and advances in data processing have drawn economists' attention to the role of personal data in markets. The economics of privacy aims to analyze how individuals, firms, and policymakers interact in markets where personal data play a key role. The complexity of these markets is challenging for academics who rely on different disciplines and methods to investigate privacy issues, including field experiments. In this article we review this literature, and point out the need to take account of the complex interactions between the different economic agents, and highlight specific strategies regarding privacy issues. First, individuals might face a puzzling tradeoff between sharing data in order to access customized services and, on the other hand, protecting their personal data against potential data misuses. Second, industrial organizations and the literature of marketing study how firms can fit personal data into their strategies; and how this can spur new business models. Third, privacy regulation is being challenged as it aims both at protecting individuals' privacy while preserving firms' capacity to innovate. In this context, the main difficulty for policymakers is to shape a clear framework for both individuals and firms. Lastly, we bring attention to the need for further research to investigate the role of privacy as a business differentiator: in other words to establish a clear link between consumers' demand and firms' offer.

Suggested Citation

  • Grazia Cecere & Fabrice Le Guel & Matthieu Manant & Nicolas Soulié, 2017. "The economics of privacy," Post-Print hal-01557755, HAL.
    • Handle: RePEc:hal:journl:hal-01557755
    DOI: 10.1057/978-1-349-95121-5_3058-1
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    To our knowledge, this item is not available for download. To find whether it is available, there are three options:
    1. Check below whether another version of this item is available online.
    2. Check on the provider's web page whether it is in fact available.
    3. Perform a search for a similarly titled item that would be available.

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Morlok, Tina & Matt, Christian & Hess, Thomas, 2017. "Privatheitsforschung in den Wirtschaftswissenschaften: Entwicklung, Stand und Perspektiven," Working Papers 1/2017, University of Munich, Munich School of Management, Institute for Information Systems and New Media.
    2. Charlson, G., 2021. "Third-Degree Price Discrimination in the Age of Big Data," Cambridge Working Papers in Economics 2159, Faculty of Economics, University of Cambridge.
    3. Alessandro Acquisti, 2023. "The Economics of Privacy at a Crossroads," NBER Chapters, in: The Economics of Privacy, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    4. Charlson, G., 2021. "Third-Degree Price Discrimination in the Age of Big Data," Janeway Institute Working Papers 2104, Faculty of Economics, University of Cambridge.

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:hal:journl:hal-01557755. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    We have no bibliographic references for this item. You can help adding them by using this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: CCSD (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://hal.archives-ouvertes.fr/ .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.