Personal data protection is sometimes presented as a legal headache, typically in the online business world. For others, usually in the activist sphere, it is seen as a way to defend our fundamental rights. Each side tends to mock the other’s point of view. Here, let us try another lens. The General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) could be seen as …

Wikipedia provides freely reusable, objective and verifiable content that every citizen may modify and improve. It is difficult to achieve this aim when it comes to providing real-time information about a crisis marked by uncertainty, as is the case with the current Covid-19 epidemic. At Télécom Paris, Caroline Rizza, a researcher in information sciences, and Sandrine Bubendorff, a sociologist, have explored how crises are approached …

By 2025 the volume of data produced in the world will have reached 250 zettabytes (1 zettabyte = 1021 bytes). Current storage media have insufficient storage capacity or suffer from obsolescence. Preserving even a fraction of this data means finding a storage device with density and durability characteristics significantly superior to those of existing systems. The European OligoArchive project, launched …

Dominique Pasquier, Télécom ParisTech, Institut Mines-Télécom (IMT) This text is published as part of the “Digital Society” column written by researchers from the Economic and Social Sciences department at Télécom ParisTech, members of the Interdisciplinary Institute for Innovation (CNRS). Some revolutions are silent ones. Internet integration in working-class areas is one such example. Where do we stand in terms of …

For over a decade now, the use of digital tools and internet connectivity has greatly developed among households, including among working classes. Yet very few studies exist on this part of the population’s specific uses of digital technology. In the context of the Poplog project, which counts Télécom ParisTech among its partners, Dominique Pasquier, a researcher in sociology, has studied …

Our electronic and computing devices are becoming smaller, more adapted to our needs, and closer to us physically. From the very first heavy, stationary and complex computers, we have moved on to our smartphones, ever at the ready. What innovations can we next expect? Éric Lecolinet, researcher in human-machine interactions at Télécom ParisTech, answers our questions about this rapidly changing …