Neurodata and Neuroprivacy: Data Protection Outdated?

Abstract

There are a number of novel technologies and a broad range of research aimed at the collection and use of data drawn directly from the human brain. Given that this data – neurodata – is data collected from individuals, one area of law which will be of relevance is data protection. The thesis of this paper is that neurodata is a unique form of data and that this will raise questions for the application of data protection law. Issues may arise on two levels. On a legal technical level, it is uncertain whether the definitions and mechanisms used in the data protection framework can be easily applied to neurodata. On a more fundamental level, there may be interests in neurodata, particularly those related to the protection of the mind, the framework was not designed to represent and may be insufficiently equipped, or constructed, to deal with.

Critical Essay: Building new management theories on sound data? The case of neuroscience

“…Like others (e.g. Hallinan et al, 2014), I have detailed previously why ethical concerns do arise in the context of applying neuroscientific methods to the study of management phenomena (Lindebaum, 2013b).…”

Narrative Devices: Neurotechnologies, Information, and Self-Constitution

“…Addressing this question requires identification of the full range of significant interests likely to be engaged, as well as attention to where the rules, functions and practices governing the (non)disclosure of information to users fail to recognise and protect these interests. Thirdly, there is a tenacious, but far from self-evident, assumption that information about our brains and minds is particularly closely related to, and uniquely revealing of who we are [21,22]. This unexamined assumption cannot to do the explanatory and normative work often demanded of it in neuroethics debates.…”

“…For example, a psychiatric diagnosis that is initially experienced as distressing and unwelcome might, for some individuals, eventually serve a valuable role by enhancing the coherence and inhabitability of their self-narratives by, for example, offering explanations for periods of psychological distress or disorientation [57]. 21 The value, desirability, or even pertinence, of particular information to someone's identity narrative is not inevitable, and will depend on their particular circumstances, cultural environment and existing self-narrative. It will be clear from what I have said so far, however, that my position stands in contrast to a concerns raised by some, specifically in relation to information communicated by consumer neurotechnologies, that neuro-information might be intrinsically detrimental to self-understanding where its objectifying and material focus supplants the putatively more direct, phenomenologically rich and authentic insights of our own senses and introspection [9,75].…”

“…The following discussion focuses on the potential identity impacts of this kind of predictive information. 22 One small qualitative study conducted semistructured interviews with six participants in a trial of this kind of predictive BCI, to explore users' 21 One example of this, albeit from a different context, may be found in some studies investigating the reactions of some donor-conceived adults to learning of their donor parentage where despite the initial distressing disruption of their existing self-conception they value having this knowledge [74]). 22 The information provided by such devices is a visual/sound alert rather than detailed verbal output.…”

Book review: Sapiens: A brief history of humankind

“…For instance, given that a brain scan is a unique 'fingerprint' of an individual, how can the data be truly anonymised? Seen in this light, how can the data processor sever the link between an individual's identity and the data that were collected for the purpose of the study (Hallinan et al, 2014)?…”