First ACM Data Economy Workshop

Data-driven decision making powered by Machine Learning (ML) algorithms is changing how the society and the economy work and is having a profound positive impact on our daily life. With the exception of very large companies that have both the data and the skills to develop powerful ML-driven services, the large majority of provably possible ML services, from e-health, to transportation and predictive maintenance, to name just a few, still remain at the idea or prototype level for the simple reason that data, the skills to manipulate them, and the business models to bring them to market, seldom co-exist under the same roof. Data has to somehow meet with the ML and business skills that can unleash its full power for the society and economy. This has given rise to a highly dynamic sector around the Data Economy, involving Data Providers/Controllers, data Intermediaries, often-times in the form of Data Marketplaces or Personal Information Management Systems for end-users to control and even monetise their personal data. Despite its huge potential and observed initial growth, the Data Economy is still at its nascent phase and, therefore, faces a yet uncertain future and a series of existential challenges. Such challenges include a broad range of technical matters across multiple disciplines of Computer Science including networks and distributed systems, security and privacy, machine learning and human computer interaction. The mission of the ACM DE workshop will be to bring together all the CS skills required for helping the Data Economy.