UK government threatens firms over hidden customer data

[dipsydoodle]

The UK government has repeated its threat to legislate if businesses do not voluntarily release data gathered on customers who ask to see it.

An initiative called Midata calls on firms to provide details to the public in a "machine-readable" format.

Ministers had warned in August they would introduce a new law if utilities, web firms and shops did not voluntarily comply with their request.

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Under the existing Data Protection Act consumers already have the power to make a "subject access request" to see the personal information companies and other organisations hold on them.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/technology-20361954

[dickthegrouch]

1. Machine readable is a terrible thing to ask for

Machine readable could be the binary data as stored in a database. It would be completely useless unless you had the application that reads it.

They need to ask for human-readable but in electronic form or some such.
My 2p as a computer design engineer.