What do my data say about me?

Photo: Pixabay.com/Sammy Williams

Data-driven technologies such as artificial intelligence or chatbots are changing the business world. Stefan Thalmann and his team investigate these new technologies.

Today, industry espionage often takes place when exchanged production data are analyzed by competitors. Many companies aren’t aware of the the knowledge that’s actually contained in the data sets they automatically share with suppliers and customers. Stefan Thalmann develops strategies that support the use of technical, organisational and legal measures for the protection of critical knowledge. This kind of concept is important, because the fear of loosing critical knowledge can be a big hurdle for the adoption of digital technologies and new business models.

WHAT IS YOUR RESEARCH GOAL? We want to investigate opportunities and challenges of new technologies for our society. For that reason, we take a design-oriented approach and develop prototypes and security concepts. We also gain theoretical knowledge by evaluating these prototypes.

WHICH CHALLENGES ARE YOU FACING? For this type of research, we often need access to company data that they don’t like to release. We need to address certain concerns before we can even begin our work.

WHAT WOULD YOU LIKE YOUR STUDENTS TO LEARN? While data-driven technologies have an enormous potential, people should also be aware of the risks they pose. Furthermore, students should achieve a basic level of technical competence, so they can design data-driven solutions for business applications and support their implementation. There’s currently a high demand for this knowledge on the job market.

WHY HAVE YOU CHOSEN TO WORK AT THE UNIVERSITY OF GRAZ? We consider it really important to examine the interaction between the different disciplines. Good networks are found here, which allow us to investigate the topic of digitalisation from many perspectives. The university also has a good reputation with companies, which is very important for my work.

Stefan Thalmann is head of the Business Analytics and Data Science Center and member of the core research area "Smart Regulation". Researchers from different disciplines analyse the chances and challenges connected with technical innovations.

Dagmar Eklaude

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