Data pools from each company will now be combined to form a massive ‘data dam’. (image: Korea Bizwire)
SEOUL, Feb. 5 (Korea Bizwire) — Trendsetting companies from various fields including communications, credit card and others will join hands to build South Korea’s first private-sector ‘data dam’.
SK Telecom Co., jointly with Shinhan Card Co., Korea Credit Bureau Co., GS Retail Co. and Real Estate 114 Inc. have formed a data alliance, announcing plans on Thursday to sign a memorandum of understanding (MOU) later this month.
Data pools from each company will now be combined to form a massive ‘data dam’.
These five companies currently own massive amounts of data related to their specialized fields.
SK Telecom, South Korea’s largest mobile carrier, owns data related to communications for all of its customers while Shinhan Card, a major credit card company, owns data related to credit card usage.
To this, the credit data owned by a credit risk management company Korea Credit Bureau, data on consumption patterns held by a major South Korean retailer GS Retail, and regional real estate data owned by a real estate information agency Real Estate 114 will be added.
The first phase of this initiative will involve all five companies sending pseudo-anonymous data to a pooling institution designated by the government.
The pooling institution will use encryption keys to combine all received data, storing analytic data only while deleting the rest.
This processed data will be sent back to the five companies, to be used to develop new services.
For instance, data on transportation, consumption, and distribution can be combined to analyze consumption patterns sorted by the brand of automobile owned by each consumer, to find out which car owners tend to demonstrate higher consumption at department stores.
Companies will be able to develop effective targets for marketing.
This project will also allow small vendors to access data on consumption patterns of local residents and their preferences, offering guidelines for marketing.
H. M. Kang (hmkang@koreabizwire.com)
