As a new supporting entity in the field of data stewardship, Mozilla’s Data Futures Lab is uniquely positioned to identify boundaries for responsible innovation, connect builders to one another, and provide resources to trailblazing organizations and initiatives. As a convener and funder, the Lab could bring others together to establish a collective vision around what data stewardship should look like.

The Mozilla Insights Team’s initial research helped to define the approaches to data stewardship in which builders can see themselves. This research builds on those frameworks to identify the existing dynamics that builders are a part of, and the ways in which language, funding sources, and audiences can change what these builders “look and feel” like.

In a majority of interviews with both builders and supporting entities, respondents agreed that they’d like to see more examples of data stewardship in the real world with documented lessons about what works and what doesn’t. As one builder said, “we need help to spread the cost and the risk around a little bit.” The Data Futures Lab can become a sandbox for experimentation that prioritizes shared learning and an attention to rebalancing power.

In addition to the broad recommendations below, we heard suggestions from partners in the field to engage in potential tactical opportunities to create support for data stewards.

• In order to support policy-making and regulation that might allow data stewardship to flourish, the Lab could create a Speaker’s Bureau to spotlight subject matter experts and public speakers who represent the Lab’s values. By placing a stake in regulation, Mozilla may contribute to opening the discourse around personal data use that is currently dominated by tech monopolies.
• While emerging research has focused on legal infrastructures for data stewardship projects, many builders still need applied support for efforts to collectivize or protect sensitive data. As articulated in the section on Consumer Views, builders currently draw resources and insight from a variety of disparate sources. The Data Futures Lab could provide legal support for data stewardship as a service for partners of the Lab. While legal expertise is not necessarily a skills gap in all projects, it can remain a language barrier between builders and regulators who need to construct necessary new incentive structures in regulatory and legal realms.

Recommendation #1: Track the effectiveness of builders’ strategies.

We propose that using the frameworks created through this research, The Data Futures Lab can ask builders to create power maps to document their theories of change in the broader social sphere or consumer market. The Lab can also ask builders to identify their primary audiences, journey maps, or other descriptive profiles that can help researchers and the general public better understand who data stewardship is for and who it’s being created by. In short, documentation about builders’ projects and the effects they have on the world can help inform how data stewardship efforts grow and learn. Project evaluations should produce knowledge that supports open research around data stewardship.

Because of the emphasis of many data stewardship projects on rebalancing power and repairing social contracts, the Lab may benefit from further research on applying tools for collective organizing to data and tech use for empowerment. Builders identified a need for collective power to shift the way that power players use data. Builders may find knowledge about collective organizing strategies helpful for crafting strategies and identifying allies in their industries.

Recommendation #2: Amplify Indigenous-owned orgs and orgs in the global south.

This research was heavily influenced by European and North American organizations because a majority of funders for data stewardship initiatives are based in Europe and North America. Builders who participated in our research and are based in the Global South noted that their priorities are necessarily influenced by their funding sources. Of the data stewardship projects not based in Europe or North America in our scan, environmental justice, consumer protections, Indigenous rights, and urban/community development were the most common focal issues.

It’s important for some organizations based in the Global North to recognize that a “global” scope of work may not be appropriate for their particular goals, and the Lab may help to ensure that local initiatives are being seeded and supported when possible. Inversely, the Lab should partner with or actively support organizations in the Global South that continue to produce globally cutting edge research so that they might help to balance the scales with Northern groups. This may entail further research into an explicitly anti-colonial set of principles to guide the Lab’s future work.

Recommendation #3: Connect builders to one another.

Builders are bringing experiences with open data, decentralized tech, justice efforts, and research communities to data stewardship projects. Many felt disconnected from other projects or unaware of other builders that existed like themselves. Because the field is so young and diffuse, with builders working across different industries and issue areas, it’s difficult to see similarities in data stewardship efforts at first glance.

Many builders have to balance business, legal, and technical challenges, as well as social or ethical concerns for mission-driven companies. And very few projects have each of those components perfectly in place. Organizations that excel in business and legal guidance for personal data uses may want to be connected with companies that build technical infrastructure for personal data wallets. Builders would like to learn from each other.

Additionally, respondents at supporting entities in particular are still unsure that there is sufficient guidance for builders to mitigate potential harm and build responsibly in the field. Certain types of risk assessments could help builders learn from one another and avoid harmful behaviors, for example, piloting experimental personal finance models in already vulnerable communities. Acting not just as a convener but as a match-maker for researchers, builders, and funders could help to ensure that lessons spread across the field and builders benefit from belonging to the Data Futures Lab community.

Recommendation #4: Build a sandbox for responsible experimentation.

Researchers imagine how the future might be with mainstream data stewardship technology. In order to get there, the Data Futures Lab and other supporting entities can help builders test their technologies without creating unintentional harm. Because data stewardship is often used as a tool to rebalance power, misusing technologies can also create harms for more vulnerable populations.

A “sandbox” for responsible testing might provide guidelines for how to build technologies using inclusive methods, how to mitigate risk when working on sensitive issues, or how to appropriately scale or geographically focus new technologies. Rules should be generated through careful research and conversation with people directly affected or disempowered by exploitative practices. The Data Futures Lab might lead the effort to convene subject matter experts, communities, and technologists to define the “sandbox” and frontline the needs of vulnerable populations.