Data ownership, mgmt, verification and privacy

Data Ownership
Google, Oracle, Yahoo and others seem to be highly interested in collecting tons of data to secure a position in the data wars of tomorrow. Quote below from here.
"The race is on to own certain classes of core data: location, identity, calendaring of public events, product identifiers and namespaces." We should expect to see increased jockeying between powerhouse players like Google, Oracle, Yahoo, etc... as they try to secure position and ownership of key data areas. So, here's the big question: Why? Simple, money. This raises quite a few questions. How will all of this data be managed? Who will have access to it? Will it be secure and private? What if you don't want information related to you collected and stored?

Data Management
Data is growing exponentially as a result of Internet use. On top of that, more and more people are going to the Internet for information and answers. This will require us to drastically change how we store and manage data. Part of managing data is to separate and categorize it. For example, false from true, research material from sales material, etc... like a library. Problem is that Internet data centers, like search engines, are not doing it and this is a big problem. Why? Because bad information is far more harmful than no information. So what we need are data verification and validation solutions.

Data Verification
One option is to have "certified" search engines or "data centers." Certified simply means that any data contained has been checked for accuracy and edited. Publishers often do this for books, magazines, and other forms of media. This is why a hard copy book carries far more credibility than some persons website or blog. So these "certified" search engines or data centers can simply store published content only. This means that only publishing houses and professionals with licenses can submit data to this search engine; unlike the search engines today where anyone in the world can submit data. A certified search engine may also have the ability auto scan (i.e. crawl) the content of reputable media sources to help populate it's database.

Data Privacy and Security
Now and in the future data privacy and security are top priority. If data is properly protected then bots, worms, viruses, spam, etc.. are powerless because they will have no ability to exploit data (email/website/customer info databases) as they do today.
Do you feel comfortable with only a few powerhouses managing most of the data on the public Internet? Well, I don't. I don't like the idea of only a few controlling the many. Thus, as a result, we may even begin to see a greater separation between public and private internet.
Yup, you got it. I speculate that private Internet's will begin to flourish. Social separation between classes and groups of people will spill over into the Internet. And no, we don't have anything like it today. I'm not talking about websites, newsgroups, clubs, chat rooms, etc.. I am talking about private (members only) Internet sections, totally closed circuit. Let me explain: You connect to the Internet today through your ISP (Internet Service Provider) via dial-up, DSL, cable, etc... once connected you "on" the Internet, the same Internet that everyone in the world uses. How would you like the option to connect to a "private" Internet? In fact, you can have the option to connect to a number of different private Internets via your ISP. One for business executives, your community, an organization, etc... You even have the option to create your own private Internet and invite others to join. Of course, people will need a special member ID and password to join. Within the private Internet all data that flows through it can be encrypted. Only those with a member ID can decrypt it.
Technology to facilitate such a concept exists today. It's called VPN (Virtual Private Networks) and MPLS (Multi-Protocol Label Switching) technology. But it is not widely used and the average home user would not know how to get it setup. So we need to rely on ISP's and other major Internet carriers to set everything up, make it easy to use and offer it as a service to home and end users.
As powerhouses battle to control certain types of data and succeed, as mentioned above, they may be the ones who begin to build these private Internet sections. Why? In order to protect their data.

The Future of Search Engines
The concept of a large single search engine for everyone will change. It just won't work anymore because A) data is growing exponentially; there will simply be too much data and B) too many privacy and protection issues. The search engine as we know it today may be segmented out to various category controllers (science, business, health, etc..), each category controlled by the data owner(s).

How to STOP SPAM

SPAM is not a technology issue, it is an Internet control process and policy issue which will require Government intervention (Internet laws) and cooperation between Internet companies, businesses and International Internet Standards Committees... which all exist today.

First off, in defense of the spammers, everyone has a right to market their product or service. The flip side is that everyone also has the right to reject or block unwanted marketing material. This is why some people decide to build gates around their home or hire a secretary to screen their business calls and letters.

Spammers do what they do because for one reason, money. Companies pay spammers lots of money to send their messages. Of course spamming is illegal in America. But there are many other countries spammers can work in, like Russia and China, who turn a blind eye to spam operations. After all, it ultimately benefits the their economy. Spammers make money, spammers spend money, everyone is happy.

Solution Options:
1. Take anonymity away from Internet users.
Imagine, everyone would suddenly be polite and bad people would get caught alot easier.
Probably not a real practical solution but it would make it possible to trace the source of spammers and Internet predators in general. Today, offshore and over seas spammers can easily hide themselves behind layers of anonymity. So it is difficult, if not impossible to find the people responsible for the spam.

2. Require all mail servers to be registered and have a Operating Permit.
***Note to non-technical reader: Mail servers are NOT your personal computer. Mail servers are operated by companies such as your Internet Service Provider or highly technical individuals and are used to enable the sending of email.***

All registered mail servers will be stored in global database(s). Companies or individuals who operate mail servers (Google, AOL, IEA, Joe Bob tech geek, etc..) have the option to ONLY accept email from registered mail servers.

***Note to techies: The global databases can be like the root name servers on the Internet today but even more distributed and difficult to take down with DDoS attacks. In fact, if the databases were part of the root name servers then people who DDoS them would only succeed in hurting themselves as name resolution would be impacted ***

In order to register a mail server one must obtain a FREE operating permit/ID. To acquire the Permit one must provide information and be verified, like a drivers license. The ID will be HIGHLY secretive and encrypted. This permit will be entered into the mail server. The permit will also be entered into the global database by the Registration Authority. If a company, such as AT&T has 2,000 mail servers then each mail server can use the same ID/Permit if they want.

The logistical details of this concept can easily be worked out.

Now, say a spammer uses a registered mail server to send spam... guess what, it gets removed from the global database for "x" time and a notice sent to the registered contact.

Say a a spammer breaks into a mail server owned by someone else and uses it to send spam, then the real owner is notified that mail server "125" was removed and can fix the problem.

The concept is similar to a National "do-not-call" database, but in reverse. A national "do-email" database, even a global "do-email" database.