Privacy and Security Issues with Big Data: Challenges and Solutions

Running head: EMERGING TECHNOLOGIES AND INNOVATION 1
Emerging Technologies and Innovation
Name
Institution

EMERGING TECHNOLOGIES AND INNOVATION 2
ABSTRACT
This research focuses on Big data privacy and the threats that come along with it. The
study intends to find a solution to the risks that are caused as well as ways in which big data can
be secured. In the research big data is explained in detail and why it experiences threat. Many
businesses nowadays use big data, and privacy and security of this data have become an issue
that many try to solve. In this research, it focuses on how this businesses that use computer
infrastructures can manage their data to offer maximum security to their clients.
Big data privacy is such a big issue that needs to be addressed because daily people are
sharing more and more information. Most of the times, this information is private and
confidential. Therefore the people want to know that the data they are sharing the technology is
secured and will not fall into the wrong hands. Most of this information is shared on social
platforms, and therefore, a secure framework needs to be implemented for the platforms. The
debate on whether big data provides top-notch security of information is a hot topic currently
(Anderson, 2016).
Some argue that the traditional systems that have been used to offer security for big data
are not valid. Some of these systems are those like firewalls and zones that are demilitarized.
These systems cannot be applied to the data computing systems because they do not assure the
security of the information. The research is based on literature review from articles and journals.

EMERGING TECHNOLOGIES AND INNOVATION 3
INTRODUCTION
Big data is a large volume of data that is comprised of businesses' day to day activities.
Big data mainly manages a large volume of data that cannot be handled by common software due
to the large size. According to an analysis done, the size of data is expected to double every two
years, and most of these data are usually unstructured. Some of the sources of these big data are
social media, surveillance footage, business transactions, image archives as well as video
archives, medical records and system logs (Bertino, 2015).
Social media has played a massive role in big data. The social media platform is
increasing day by day, and more people are using the internet as a way to connect and
communicate. In the past years, the number of social media apps has grown exponentially from
facebook to twitter. Therefore, more and more data is being shared online and much of which is
private information (Blok & Lemmens, 2015). On the other hand, many more businesses are
feeling the need to protect their enterprises through surveillance footage. Homeowners also are
investing in surveillance technology to protect their homes. This information is part of Big data
security as well (Cuzzocrea, 2014).
UNDERSTANDING BIG DATA
People carry out daily business transactions which are also a part of big data. Large
organizations, for example, are always carrying out business transactions which are confidential
to the company and the people involved in the transactions. Therefore, there is a need to protect
this data from being breached (Crawford & Schultz, 2014).
A lot of hospitals are investing in the electronic computation of medical records. This is
because it is more efficient and more effective. The medical records are very confidential, and it
is essential that the data is kept safe and that it does not fall into the wrong hands. Hospitals

EMERGING TECHNOLOGIES AND INNOVATION 4
consider Big data privacy as a very hot topic because they want to ensure that their data and that
of their patients are safe (Chin, Fan & Haines, 2014).
Lastly, we have video and image archives and in this instance, many people are storing
their images and videos on the cloud. This is an efficient way to save the space in their phones
and computers and also practical storage. However, some raise the concerns of whether this
information stored in the cloud is safe. They want to be assured that their data is secured (Da Xu,
He & Li, 2014).
There is an increased number of devices that are connected to the Internet, and this raises
more concerns for big data because more and more data is being produced. This data needs to be
transformed into valuable information for use. Nowadays, one can purchase storage of data from
public cloud providers. Public clouds have managed to help big data to expand. This has led to
the decreased use of traditional ways of data security such as firewalls. This is because they are
no longer effective as they cannot support the massive amounts of data (Dastjerdi & Buyya,
2016).
The security that is required for big data needs to be heterogeneous, and the hardware and
operating systems need to be diverse. For one to make big data secure, then they need to consider
the use of the Software-Defined network (SDN). An SDN is very important to big data and to
solve the issues of privacy and security that come along with it (Hashem et al., 2015). The
network separates the control plane from the infrastructure which allows the administrators to
write programs that can specify how an entire network behaves. This contrasts with the
traditional networks that force the administrator to code the functionality of the system
(Gandomi & Haider, 2015).