The man who created the world wide web — and gave it away for free — Tim Berners-Lee, is now starting a project to take back personal data from big tech and protect it for the individual, as the New York Post reported.
The platform, which he calls "Solid," will consolidate a user's online personal data that has been given away to big tech companies, protecting it from what has become "an engine of inequity and division," according to the British-born scientist.
"Solid changes the current model where users have to hand over personal data to digital giants in exchange for perceived value," he wrote on the website for his new company Inrupt. "As we've all discovered, this hasn't been in our best interests."
Solid, the storing of online data, creates a pod (personal online data) and gives users control over how and where their information is shared on the Internet. Berners-Lee is fully expecting a fight from big tech to fund and get this open-source project going.
"We are not talking to Facebook and Google about whether or not to introduce a complete change where all their business models are completely upended overnight," he told Fast Company. "We are not asking their permission."
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