Best Practices for Working Creatively with Personal Data

KTVR Reflexive Questions

The remainder of the guidelines take the form of reflexive questions aimed to assist artists in making informed decisions about ethical and privacy issues when working with personal data. These guidelines are meant to help artists prevent, mitigate, or avoid issues as they relate to the use of personal data in creative works, in particular sensitive data such as medical scans. We’ve organized our guidelines into the following subsections:

1. Anonymization 

Is the data really anonymous? 

2. Provenance, Access, and Licencing 

Where does the data come from? How has the data been processed? How can you access the data? What do you have to do to obtain access to the data? 

3. Consent 

Who gave you permission to use the data? Who made the data available? What kind of permission to use the data was provided, if any, and on what grounds was it provided? 

4. Participation, Authorship, and Dissemination 

Are those who provided the data either participants or collaborators in its accessibility and dissemination? Are data subjects participants, contributors, collaborators, or authors? 

5. Data Subjects 

How do different cultures understand sensitive personal data such as medical and biometric data? 

6. Sustainability and Data Production 

Is it essential to acquire new data, or can existing data be used to create an artwork?

7. Artificial Intelligence 

Is AI used in the art project; if so, what kind? Is the artist in control of what the AI is doing with the data?