The Telcos' Application of Big Data, IOT and AI and the Consumer Perception of their Privacy Protection: Case of Taiwan

With the rapid spread of big data within various fields, there are many innovative applications related to smart manufacturing, smart cities and smart living that have been created, but big data has also raised concerns surrounding privacy and data security. The Internet of things (IoT), which is the network of physical objects connected to the Internet that can allow objects to be controlled remotely, resulting in improved efficiency (Samad, 2016). Artificial intelligence (AI) is an integrated system, processing big data collected from the sensors of the IoT networks, finding meaningful implications, and providing various individualized services to consumers and organizations. Therefore, big data, the IoT, and AI are essential components of an interconnected society (Liu & Chou, 2018).

Big data can help telcos to personalize services and do promotions by using consumers’ demographics, location and interaction history. If the telcos want to provide personalized services successfully, the consumers have to be willing to share their personal data. However, today consumers are far from willing to share. AI is a fast growing and promising general technology but it is also likely to expose new social and policy issues (Kwon, 2018).

This presentation will be divided into two parts. In part 1, Prof. Liu will discuss (1) what kind of AI related services have been provided by Taiwan’s telcos; (2) what roles do Taiwan’s telcos play in the AI ecosystem? (3) what are the challenges for Taiwan’s telcos to provide AI related services? In part 2, Prof. Liu will employ big data analysis to discuss consumer perceptions of Taiwan telcos’ use of their personal data. Also, she will use online surveys to analyze consumers' views on privacy protection of Taiwan telecom operators using their personal data.