The Afterlife of Data

"""Fascinating. . . . [Deep] questions of memorialization, ownership and preservation, deftly teased out by the author."" * Wall Street Journal * ""[A] groundbreaking empirical and philosophical exploration of how we should think about, and act to protect, data generated by those who have died. . . . Compulsively readable, peppered with engaging personal anecdotes, rich historical examples, and analyses of major cultural touchstones that offer readers insight into one of the most important digital ethics debates of the day."" * Science * “This short and accessible book is not to be missed. Öhman draws on his groundbreaking research to explore a pressing issue facing any digital society: the rapid accumulation and management of data belonging to the dead. The Afterlife of Data is a fascinating, provocative, and theoretically rich exploration of the ethics and politics of our digital remains. It will be of personal interest to any mortal with a digital presence.” * Luciano Floridi, author of The Ethics of Artificial Intelligence * “What happens to the data of the deceased was first regarded as a morbid curiosity, then as a niche concern for those with particularly hefty digital footprints. With deft reasoning and great eloquence, Öhman exposes the true scope and significance of the digital dead, and how fundamentally they are intertwined with our collective present and future. In finely tuned, incisive prose that cuts straight to the bone, he effortlessly brings readers into deeper understandings of novel territories and urges us toward what ultimately feels like an obvious conclusion: the digital dead are our responsibility, for without them, we lose ourselves.” * Elaine Kasket, author of All the Ghosts in the Machine * “The online presence of the dead may seem like a somewhat marginal, if creepy, quirk of life in the internet era. But as Öhman shows in this clear-eyed and wide-ranging book, the digital dead sit at the intersection of fundamental historical, economic, and cultural forces. Situating hypercontemporary phenomena within a human narrative stretching all the way back to prehistory, he guides us through urgent problems of the ownership, exploitation, preservation, and destruction of the dead. The Afterlife of Data makes it inescapably clear that, as the first citizens of a new global archive, we owe it to both those who have died and those yet to be born to take control of our digital destiny.” * Patrick Stokes, author of Digital Souls * “The very possibility of storing and retrieving ‘digital remains’ poses complex and interconnected questions about data ownership, expectations about privacy and the duties one generation may owe another.” * Inside Higher Ed * ""What happens to all the mountains of personal data. . . after you die? Who owns them? Who wants them? Who is trying to make money from them? These and many more such questions bother Carl Ohman in his remarkably wide-ranging examination called The Afterlife of Data. There is lots to think about here. The book takes readers in directions they never considered, and weighs pluses and minuses of each path and aspect. It is exhaustive and thorough. . . big data, Ohman says, probably knows more about you than you do."" * Medium * ""According to author Carl Öhman, how we navigate our digital remains is one of the most important issues of the 21st century. As he notes in his book, The Afterlife of Data, the data we produce today is arguably the largest archive of human behavior ever assembled in the history of our species. . . . With every search and click, we offer more and more to these platforms. Leaving behind a trail of activity—the accumulation of which forms a living, breathing data identity that doesn’t necessarily die with our physical bodies and still holds immense value to many stakeholders long after we’re gone."" * Grazia Magazine *"