If you want to wrestle control of your personal data from companies, governments, hospitals and other organizations, a startup called Inrupt could be an ally. The company’s idea: store your personal information separately and share only what’s necessary with services only when you’re accessing them.
Inrupt calls these data collections “pods,” and they can be accessed using the company’s open-source data storage technology called Solid. You could store fitness data, for example, then share it when your doctor’s Solid app requested access. Or you could store your photos in a pod, pay one Solid app provider to pick your best shots, then pay another to print them.
A big name behind Inrupt is Tim Berners-Lee, who invented the world wide web. Berners-Lee, who serves as chief technology officer, co-founded the company with Chief Executive John Bruce. Inrupt has been testing its service with the BBC, NatWest Bank and the National Health Service in the UK, and with the Flanders government in recent months. On Monday, the company made its Enterprise Solid Server, the infrastructure that supports the service, available to any interested customer.
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