Q+A: Can big data be used for good?
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What is big data and why does it make people uneasy?
Welcome to Fear and Greed QA, where we ask and answer questions about business, investing, economics, politics, and more. I'm Sean Aylmer. Big data has become an incredibly powerful tool for businesses, governments, and researchers. But what can it actually tell us? And how can it be used for good? Professor Andreas Chai is Director of Griffith University's Academy of Excellence in Financial Crime Investigation. and compliance. Andreas, welcome to Fear and Greed. Thanks, Sean. Lovely to be here. Let's start with the basics. Define big data. What are you actually talking about?
Oh look, so big data is effectively anything that you can't analyze in a Microsoft Express Excel spreadsheet. You know, to put it in really simple terms, if it's there's too much stuff to download onto a spreadsheet, then that that's like a easy way to think about what's really big.
That is a very easy way to think about it. I'm gonna use that forever from now. Um, we've sort of grown up in big data's been around for a while.
How can big data be used to expose hidden financial activity?
We still are a bit scared of it. There's still anxiety around it. People hear the term, think about companies tracking what they do. Why do you think it does make us so uncomfortable?
Oh yeah, look. So there's been a lot of technological, you know, innovation way back when during the uh first Trump election there was the um Cambridge Analytica controversy where all of a sudden, you know, people uh using their Facebook uh apps uh discovered that they were being used for marketing purposes. So it definitely sort of creates a bit of fear. Are out there. And you know, data just is is very revealing. So there's always this tension in the sense that people don't like it when you know that's being used for marketing or manipulation purposes, which is absolutely correct. At the same time, we have this tension that we don't have seem to have a problem with giving it away. Every time we click on terms and acceptances, it's sort of or we
Get a $50 free voucher, people, you know, tend to go, yep, if I'll I'm happy to give away my data. So there's this tension that um, you know, it there's sort of this murkiness that some bad things can can come out and jump at at you, especially with um the pri the breaches that we've had with Optus and um other places as well. I think um Australia is one of the most hacked countries in the world. So there's a lot of data floating around. around in in on the dark web, which can also be used for all sorts of ill intentioned purposes.
So let's jump to the other side.
What methods do researchers use to spot anomalies in spending versus income?
Let's look at the other side of it. You can actually use data. In fact, what you're you're doing at Griffith University is trying to kind of look at the shadow economy. So use data. To look at that, find out the economic activity that you probably won't be able to see otherwise, how spending patterns reveal what's happening beneath the surface. Just explain what you're doing.
Yeah, that's absolutely correct. So the the tables are s are starting to turn because it's always been the case that, you know, it's the bad actors, the the criminal organizations or the scammers who are using technology to attack us. So our academy is part of the effort to try and turn things around, to use uh big data for good or AI for good. So what we are doing is we are using the latest techniques to try and really Trace and track and identify where bad actors are sort of getting active and help the police and others to try and really cut down and disrupt the financial crime activity. So one good example is banks. Banks have millions of transactions every minute, and uh they are sort of doing a lot of work around reporting, but also disrupting.
Things like scams and money laundering operations and things that, you know, generally we as Australians would agree we need we need less of that. And if we get onto that and if we do it proactively, that helps support the, you know, protects vulnerable customers and citizens who might be subject to that attack. It's better for the integrity of our financial system. And at the end of day creates a more fair society because you know people who are say you know avoiding to to pay taxes there there's less likelihood of of them getting away with it which is just creates um more trust in in society and uh increases the integrity in our f of our financial institutions.
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Chapters
8 chapters
1
What is big data and why does it make people uneasy?
0:05–1:07
2
How can big data be used to expose hidden financial activity?
1:07–2:41
3
What methods do researchers use to spot anomalies in spending versus income?
2:41–4:36
4
How does big data help banks detect scams and money‑laundering?
4:36–6:19
5
What are the privacy trade‑offs when regulators collect more data?
6:19–7:43
6
How is AI being applied to fight financial crime in Australia?
7:43–9:02
7
What role should digital identity and education play in online safety?
9:02–10:45
8
Why is it important for Australians to become more savvy about big data?
10:45–12:02
Speakers
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