How the EU Can Unlock the Private Sector’s Human-Mobility Data for Social Good

Many businesses routinely collect data about the location of consumers, such as where they are when they make a purchase or use a mobile app. Aggregating this information reveals useful insights about human mobility and social interaction. Researchers, governments, and others can use this mobility data, while respecting user privacy, to study and address many pressing societal challenges, such as disease spread, urban functioning, forced migration, climate change, and disaster response. To support these types of applications, EU policymakers should encourage businesses to share mobility data by implementing policies that provide firms with regulatory clarity, financial incentives, and technical resources to give out this type of data.

To address challenges and create opportunities for social good, policymakers in the EU should work to encourage the reuse of private sector mobility data. This report offers several recommendations for how EU policymakers can support unlocking private sector mobility data for social good.