TALAMANA · THE AI LITERACY MAP FOR ARCHITECTURE AND DESIGN · Ethics & Provenance · AGE 11—15 · FACTUAL · DURABLE

Your data has value

Another organisation's computers may keep what you upload, and you cannot take it back.

The idea

Data about you is being collected all the time. The apps you tap, the videos you pause on, the words a smart speaker hears, the photos you upload. When you upload to an online service, another organisation's computers may receive it, use it, and keep it — to pick your ads, to improve their machine, or sometimes to sell. That is why it has value. Before you upload anything, ask two questions. What am I handing over? And is it only mine to hand over? A photo of your friends is not only yours.

Why it matters

You cannot take an upload back. Thinking for three seconds before it leaves your phone is the cheapest protection there is.

See it in the studio

A student uploads a photo of a classmate's sketchbook to an AI tool "to see what it does." The classmate never agreed. The sketch is now on a company's computer, and may stay there.

Watch for this

"It's a free app." Free apps are paid for somehow. Sometimes the payment is data — yours. Find out which before you trust one.

Try it

Open one app's settings and find the page that says what it collects. Write down two things on that list you did not expect.

Prove it

Name two kinds of data an app collects about you without asking each time, and say one thing you would not upload without asking someone first.

How it works

Most countries now have laws about personal data. India passed one in 2023, the Digital Personal Data Protection Act, and the rules that make it work, the DPDP Rules, 2025, are coming into force in stages. If you are under 18, the Act treats you as a child, and the rules about a parent's consent for your data are scheduled to start in May 2027 — the You are a child in the data law card on this map is about exactly that. The European Union has had a data law since 2018. These laws give you some rights over your data. But a law can only help after something has gone wrong. The habit of asking "what am I handing over?" helps before.

What this idea builds on

What this idea opens up

Sources

Open this idea on the map · The complete map · Logika · RBDS AI Lab, India · revised every edition.

Age grows from 11 at the centre to 22 at the edge, and six sectors show the learning strands. Tab into the map and the arrow keys step from idea to idea, following the links where there is one. Enter opens the idea under the cursor, and E reads out its links and the reason recorded on each. Press slash for Search, question mark for the full key list, and Escape to leave. Open Ideas for the complete readable list, including what each idea builds on and what it opens up.

LOGIKA · RBDS AI LAB INDIA
ON-RAMP · AGE 11 · FIRST ENCOUNTERS, NOT GATES — IDEAS · — DEPENDENCIES
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