ABSTRACT
Recent debates instigated by the Cambridge Analytica/Facebook scandal reveal the transformative effect of big data analytics and artificial intelligence in modern political campaigning. This chapter summarises and contextualises the contributions contained in the present volume, which explore the issues arising from political micro-targeting in the age of big data analytics from an interdisciplinary and international perspective. The profiling practices that underlie data-driven political campaigns raise profound privacy issues. The use of the personal data of voters by political parties and movements, data brokers and the platforms on which they engage with the electorate are in many jurisdictions not adequately regulated. The contributions to this volume demonstrate that enhanced regulation of the use of personal data in the political process is needed not only to safeguard individual privacy but also for the protection of public discourse and democratic participation more broadly. Our democracy will suffer if we do not address the new threats to privacy arising from data-driven political campaigning.
