Data as the New Oil

In the centuries ever since, empires have risen and fallen over control of tangible resources: gold, land, and oil—foundational powerhouses of global strength, tangible vessels to feed the ambitions of nations.  Yet, in the 21st century, a new resource has quietly redefined power: data.  Data is invisible, boundless, and woven into almost every aspect of modern life, and its boundless promise for unlocking new insight into human behavior knows no borders.  Now, as states seek sovereignty over this digital wealth, the world faces a paradox: As nations try to harness data’s power, it risks solidifying a new border around a resource that once was open, which would break up the global flow of information, fragment the internet, and devastate our liberties. 

The modern world is on the verge of a critical rise of digital sovereignty, where governments want sovereignty over citizens’ data, to a global governance framework that regulates this borderless world.  As states become data guardians, the nation’s and the world’s interests stand at odds, and competition for security and autonomy ensues.  However, as countries define the rules of the digital world, it is a rule that the future of freedom, privacy, and human autonomy hinges on—a lesson that control is both a source of reassurance and vulnerability.

Data as the New Oil: A Resource Beyond Borders

In the 21st century, data has assumed the role once occupied by oil: a priceless resource that can recreate economies, make politics, and set world power.  However, unlike oil, data is limitless and immaterial and travels effortlessly across state borders, making it difficult to accept that it is subject to ownership and law.  Nowadays, in a world where almost every interaction we make—every purchase, search query, and every share on social media—leaves a digital footprint, data has become a window into what people think, feel, and want.  As straightforward service providers, corporations like Google, Amazon, and Tencent have grown into giants collecting everything like personal information, analyzing it, and monetizing it, even shaping consumer choices and political opinions with insights so powerful. 

The result has been this unprecedented concentration of informational power beyond the confines of geography that provides corporations with an influence that national governments, whose jurisdictions are geographically limited, cannot approach.  As a result, countries are starting to treat data like a national asset, to be overseen by the same central agencies that manage oil reserves.  China’s uncompromising data control policies and Europe’s all-encompassing GDPR demonstrate an increasing understanding of the value of data. 

Yet, the yearning for the recapture of data ownership, though, as borders are being drawn on a borderless asset, creates a paradox—states attempting to draw borders around something that cannot be controlled, leading to a fragmented digital landscape and the rise of a ‘splinternet’ potentially damaging synergies across the globe.  Thus, in their pursuit of sovereignty, nations have to confront a critical question: Is data, by its very nature, global and interconnected, truly controllable, or does controlling it play against its power and restrict it in connection with its lesser, less transformative nature?  Yet, this is, for the most part, the crux of the modern fight for digital power.

The Rise of Digital Sovereignty: Nations as New Data Guardians

In ever-globally deepening data, countries are being pushed to reconnect with this essential resource to lay claim to a new concept now termed ‘digital sovereignty.’ This stems from a period when digital space was more or less a lawless frontier and digital space signified unfettered flows of information and interaction across borders.  However, now that data has been infused into the underpinnings of power, economic opportunity, and even national security, states are reasserting their authority and becoming guardians of their digital footprint.  Now that governments realize they jeopardize their economic independence and political stability by allowing foreign corporations to collect, store and exploit national data without oversight, they are actively taking measures to reclaim them.  The European Union, particularly with its General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR), is an example of stringent data privacy regulations; the requirements apply to companies within the EU borders and any company around the world. 

Likewise, China has gone as far as to impose strict so-called data localization rules, which mandate that data created within its borders be kept locally and thus prevented from being accessed by foreign entities to secure its security and economics.  The trend toward data sovereignty represents a nation’s desire to preserve its citizens from external surveillance, economic exploitation, and political influence.  However, nations have their challenges to overcome in this endeavor due to the inherent nature of the resource being sought; the imposition of digital borders on a ubiquitous and networked resource like data carries with them the danger of fragmenting the digital landscape into a spate of restricted data flows and stifled cross-border cooperation.  As states step into the role of data guardians, the challenge is to protect their sovereignty whilst maintaining the openness upon which the digital age depends—a balancing act that will mark the future of national security and the wider networked world.

The Paradox of Digital Sovereignty: Power and the Erosion of Freedom

As states increasingly assert control over data within their borders, a fundamental paradox emerges: But chasing digital sovereignty—an attempt to protect national interests and citizens’ privacy—begins to blunt individual freedom.  As governments claim the role of data guardians, governments inevitably have unique access to the personal details of their citizens.  This authority could quickly turn from a protective oversight regime into pervasive surveillance.  The paradox is most clearly seen in authoritarian regimes where digital sovereignty has become a tool for control. China’s massive data laws and its surveillance infrastructure grant the state ever-increasing leverage to monitor, regulate, and control the online activity of individuals, shaping public opinion and crushing dissent.  However, the paradox is not just an authoritarian affair. 

Attempts to ensure individual privacy rights can even be detrimental to democratic governments when they attempt to secure the country and its people from external threats.  For example, countries like India have been reacting with policies to perceived security concerns, such as data localization policies that mandate data storage domestically to make it easier for the state to access information.  This raises critical ethical questions: But can governments resist the temptation to use that data as a tool of control when, in return, they control the data in the name of protection?  Is the pursuit of digital sovereignty able to coexist with the freedom and privacy digital spaces once intended to safeguard?  The challenge for nations attempting to reap the rewards of digital power is now becoming starkly apparent—unmanaged power can take away the autonomy and liberty of those it is trying to protect, as the promise of data sovereignty becomes a double-edged sword.

 Global Governance and the Fragmentation of Digital Power

The push for digital sovereignty has exposed a hard truth to the ideal of a single, borderless internet—a fractured realm of divided digital space in which national interests are increasingly playing out.  In different geographical regions, countries are enacting new data regulations, seizing control over information within their jurisdictions, and the global digital network is splintering into a ‘splinternet’, where consistent policies are being replaced with patched-together policies and localized standards.  For example, Brazil’s General Data Protection Law (LGPD) mirrors the European Union’s GDPR. 

It delineates extremely tough privacy rights and obligations for data processing with a specific focus on Brazilian law and the country’s priorities.  Conversely, Russia exercises its data localization law, obliging all data concerning its citizens to be stored within its borders to protect its digital infrastructure from foreign intervention.  At the same time, India introduced the Data Protection Bill, which compels local storage and oversight of some types of data but with an eye on national security and autonomy from global tech giants.  Each nation’s digital priorities are distinct, ranging from privacy and economic self-reliance to political stability and ideological control, and they all have a policy that reflects them, making the regulatory landscape for multinational corporations very complex, as they have to comply with multiple regulations across borders, which are, in turn, different from each other. 

This proliferation of competing data standards has added new challenges to collaborative action on urgent global problems, from cybersecurity and cross-border data exchange to fighting misinformation and expanding global digital inclusion.  Nonetheless, how do we build a consensus around data governance frameworks to align with harmonized practices when countries consider sovereignty vs. the unified digital space proposed by the United Nations, the G20, and the World Economic Forum?  Thus, as digital borders multiply, the fragmentation of digital power underscores a profound dilemma: Feeling more protection over their autonomy, countries increasingly risk that their protection of universality will end the web as a universal entity that once defined the web, leaving the global constituent on a crossroad between national sovereignty and how much they should make progress together.

The Future of Freedom and Individual Autonomy in a Data-Driven World

As nations assert control over data in the name of sovereignty and security, a crucial question arises: What does this shift mean for freedom and liberty?  Today, in an age of data-driven algorithms deciding what we consume for news, products to purchase, and even opinions to form, the ability to manipulate human behavior extends beyond the reach of governments and companies to the fabric of digital interaction itself.  Off the backs of personal information about consumers like never before, states and companies alike have used machine learning to algorithmically predict consumer behavior and then influence those consumers, nudging them toward choices they might not have otherwise made, all with the cover of invisibility.  For example, China’s Social Credit System establishes credit scores for citizens based on how well they meet defined norms of good behavior and the ethic of freedom in a digital world of ever more invisible decision-making processes. 

Can freedom survive where everything from one’s actions to one’s preference to thoughts can be observed—and even manipulated?  Whether or not societies can maintain some boundaries that guard individuals against undue state or social influence that reaps the benefits of data-driven innovation balanced with the preservation of genuine human autonomy is the future of personal liberty.  As digital sovereignty advances, the task ahead is formidable: How can data benefit societies while respecting principles of freedom and self-determination—characteristics of human dignity?

Conclusion

In this digital world, nations are moving towards a point where they can control the world’s data.  Like all oil, it is now of equal importance, and the governments are working to protect it for national security, economic independence, and (now and then) identity.  However, it comes at a price.  To control citizen data, countries are building digital walls and blocking the open and connected internet, which may close down the borders for information flow and collaboration.  Instead, the equilibrium between government control and freedom of the individual is, at best, tenuous and, at worst, blurred and distorted along the line that marks the difference between protection and intrusion. 

In a world that is becoming more driven by data, today’s choices of nations will determine both personal freedom and the future of global cooperation.  In the digital age, security, and freedom can proceed if we find a means of respecting national interests while protecting individual rights.  By presuming that we can have this balance, we need to make thoughtful decisions about that balance—decisions that understand the power of data and are clear-eyed about it but do not undermine the ideals that enable societies and individuals to flourish.