托福双语阅读素材：为我们服务的银行家应该成为我们的社交好友吗?

想要提高托福阅读能力，我们一定要在日常生活中有意识地增加英语阅读量，提升语感和熟练度，这其中比较常用也比较方便地一个方式就是利用各类英文报刊杂志文章进行精读与泛读练习。下面我们来看一篇经济学人文章：为我们服务的银行家应该成为我们的社交好友吗?

Data, financial services and privacy

Should our bankers be our Facebook friends?

数据、金融服务和隐私

为我们服务的银行家应该成为我们Facebook上的好友吗?

DONALD TRUMP’s health-insurance premiums could soon go up, and not just because of his love of burritos. Data-crunchers计算器have found a link between the negativity of someone’s tweets and his risk of dying of heart disease. The education levels of your Facebook friends or the activity on your phone can help reveal how likely you are to repay a loan. Money-managers are rummaging ever more curiously through customers’ digital lives. 特朗普的医疗保费可能很快就会上涨，这不仅仅是因为他特别爱吃墨西哥卷饼。数据研究公司已经发现，人们在推特上的负面言论和他们死于心脏病的风险之间存在关联。你Facebook上好友的受教育程度，或是你在手机上的活动，能够帮助判断你偿还贷款的可能性。金融机构正越来越满怀好奇地搜罗[别老seek]客户数字生活的方方面面。

This is all part of an “intensifying data arms-race in finance”, says Magda Ramada Sarasola from Willis Towers Watson, a consultancy, which claims that no industry used more big data last year. Banks and insurers used to rely only on what customers and credit agencies told them, but today websites and mobile-banking apps let them get much more close and personal. Less conventional sources are also popular. Social-media profiles, web-browsing, loyalty cards and phone-location trackers can all help. In a trial, FICO, America’s main credit-scorer, found that the words someone uses in his Facebook status could help predict his creditworthiness (tip: avoid “wasted”). Even facial expressions and tone of voice are being studied for risk.这些都是“加剧的金融业数据军备竞赛”的一部分，咨询公司韦莱韬悦的玛格达·罗曼达·萨拉索拉表示。该公司称，去年没有哪个行业运用的大数据比金融业更多。银行和保险公司过去通常只依赖客户和征信机构告诉它们的信息，但如今，网站和手机银行应用让它们能更接近客户，获得更多个人信息。不那么传统的信息来源也很流行。社交媒体上的个人信息、网络浏览、会员卡、电话定位跟踪都能发挥作用。在一次试验中，美国的主要信用评分机构FICO发现某人在Facebook状态中使用的词语能帮助预测他的信用度(提示：避免出现“大醉”字眼)。甚至表情和语调也可以用来研究风险。

Believers say such trawling will get customers cheaper and better products. But consumer advocates accuse the industry of deliberate vagueness about its intentions. Financiers, unlike gamblers, have always used data. But most people, when they accept the terms of a new app or click away that annoying cookie message, have no idea what they give away, to whom and for what purpose. According to the European Commission’s statistics agency, Eurostat, 81% of Europeans feel they don’t wholly control their online data; 69% worry that firms may use their data for purposes other than[逻辑] those advertised.信赖此道的人们认为如此网罗数据将能让客户以更低的价格得到更好的产品。但消费者权益保护组织指责这一行业故意模糊自己的意图。金融家和赌徒不一样，他们总是使用数据。但大多数人在他们接受新应用的条款或者点击关闭烦人的cookie信息时，并不知道他们向谁泄露了什么信息，以及这些信息将被用于何处。根据欧盟委员会的统计机构欧盟统计局的数据，81%的欧洲人感觉他们的在线数据并非完全由自己控制;69%的欧洲人担心各家公司可能会将他们的数据用于已公告的用途之外。

Regulators are taking an interest. In September Britain’s Financial Conduct Authority said it worried that big data could price[逻辑]risky clients out of insurance. In May the European Banking Authority warned that the integrity of the financial sector could be at stake if insecure data use eroded trust. In December European regulators listed concerns over privacy and ethical issues. They are now consulting the industry to see if stricter rules are needed. 监管机构对此表示关切[词汇翻译]。去年9月，英国金融市场行为监管局表示，它担心大数据可能导致对高风险客户开价过高，让他们无力[逻辑]购买保险。去年5月，欧洲银行管理局(European Banking Authority)警告，如果不安全的数据使用侵蚀了信任，金融业的诚信就可能面临风险。在12月，欧洲监管机构列举了对于隐私和道德问题的担忧。它们如今正在与金融界商议，看是否要出台更严格的规则。

Data can improve predictions of whether someone will fall ill or drive into a tree. Good algorithms are faster and cheaper than underwriters. Insurers also claim that the better they know customers, the more they can help change bad habits. The industry insists more customer data mean “tailored” products: someone about to bungee jump can be warned that his life policy doesn’t cover this, and be offered an add-on. Banks can protect customers against fraud if they follow their whereabouts. These techniques can also help people outside the financial system gain access to finance. For the 64m Americans without sufficient credit history and the 2bn people around the world without a bank account, this would be good news. 数据能够改进预测，比如预测某人是否会生病或开车撞上大树。好的算法比核保人员更快速且低价。保险公司也宣称它们对客户了解越多，就越能帮助他们改变坏习惯。保险业坚称有了更多的客户数据就能提供“定制化”[词汇翻译]产品，例如可向准备蹦极的人发出警告，告知其寿险保单并不涵盖这一项目，并向他提供附加保险项目。如果银行去跟踪客户的行踪，就能保护他们免受欺诈。这些技术还能帮助金融体系之外的人获得金融服务。对于6400万没有充足信用记录的美国人，以及全世界约20亿没有银行账户的人来说，这会是个好消息。

But critics fear too much data-crunching could actually increase financial exclusion. The riskiest customers, and those offline, might be priced out. The more the industry relies on complex—and proprietary—algorithms, feeding machines that keep learning, the harder it will be for customers, and regulators, to untangle why they were rejected. And algorithms can be wrong. A bilingual speaker’s search-engine entries could look erratic; a social-worker’s location-tracker could imply a risky lifestyle. And since it is unclear how judgments are made, says Frederike Kaltheuner, from Privacy International, “you could get stuck in a Kafkaesque situation where you’re put in a certain box and can’t find out why, and can’t get out.” 但是批评者担心过度的数据分析实际上会加剧金融体系对一些人的排斥。风险最高的客户，还有那些不上网的人，可能会被金融体系以高价拒之门外。这一行业对复杂和专有的算法(输入给持续学习的机器)依赖越多，客户和监管机构就越难搞清[别老figure out]楚为什么客户会被拒绝。而且算法可能会出错。双语人士的搜索历史[小词活用]可能看起来难以捉摸，社会工作者的位置跟踪可能显示出一种高风险的生活状态。此外，国际隐私组织(Privacy International)的费雷德里克·凯休纳(Frederike Kaltheuner)称，既然不清楚判断是如何做出的，“你可能就会陷入卡夫卡式的困境，被随意归入一类，既不知道原因也无法脱身。”

卡夫卡困境：在西方文化里面，有一个专门的用语叫做卡夫卡式的困境(Kafkaesque predicament)，卡夫卡是一个非常典型的处于“边缘时代”的“边缘人”，他出生成长于捷克，但却是纯粹的奥地利人，他是商人的儿子，但却疏远数字和计算，他是犹太人，但却远离自己的出身，在他生活的大时代，也就是20世纪前夜，奥地利正处于一个混乱不堪的拐点，作为奥匈帝国的中心，奥地利在文学，音乐，建筑，心理学等方面无比的繁荣，勋伯格，弗洛伊德，维特根斯坦等大师都是出于这个时期，但是与之形成剧烈反差的是整个帝国却已经处于崩溃的边缘，与之相配套的旧有的社会结构和价值体系开始逐步瓦解，信仰的危机导致的是全社会范围内的失调和无序，绝望和悲观的情绪在整个帝国震荡蔓延，而这种无力的碎裂感在作为一个边缘人，作为一个找不到归属感的卡夫卡身上会表现的更加突出，我们能从他的代表作《审判》和《变形记》里面看到这种心灵在混乱无序扭曲状态之下巨大的煎熬和焦虑。——喵大歪楼

Yet privacy is a fluid[小词活用] concept. A survey last year by EY, a consultancy, found that around half of digitally savvy customers were happy to share more data with their bank, if they got something back. It also depends on context. When Tesco, a British retailer, uses data from loyalty cards to offer shoppers discounts on their favourite treats, few are bothered. But use the same data to help calculate an insurance premium (as it does), and many find it creepy. 然而隐私是一个不断变化的概念。去年咨询公司安永的调查显示，如果能得到一些回报，大约有一半熟练操作数字通信的客户都乐意和银行分享更多数据。这也取决于具体情况。当英国零售商乐购根据会员卡数据向购物者提供折扣，供他们购买心仪之物时，没什么人对此感到困扰。但使用同样的数据来计算保费时(它确实也这样做了)，很多人都感到骇人。

Keeping customers happy is not about what is legal, but about what they think is off-limits. People give uninformed consent to all sorts of things online. But users can feel tricked and spied on if they learn their data have been sold or used in unexpected ways. Retailers struggle with this too, but customers expect their bank to respect their privacy more, says Torsten Eistert from A.T. Kearney, a strategy firm. 要让客户满意，关键并不在于行为合法，而在于了解哪里是他们所认为的“禁区”。在网上，人们在不知情的情况下对一切事情表示同意。但如果用户知道自己的数据被出售或者用于意料之外的方面，他们就会有受骗以及被窥视之感。零售商也在努力应对这一问题，但客户希望银行能更尊重他们的隐私，战略咨询公司科尔尼的托尔斯滕·艾斯特说。

Trading data

Regulators have a role to play, particularly in dealing with questions of discrimination and exclusion. If using someone’s browsing history to exclude them from an offer for a cheap flight is OK, is it also reasonable to use those data to lock them out of health insurance (eg, by assuming that someone who Googles doughnut shops is a bad risk)? Now that Amazon sells loans, Alibaba has a payments business and Facebook has patented a credit-rating system, regulators should be at least as worried about non-traditional financiers and fintech startups, which sometimes escape regulation. The European General Data Protection Regulation, which comes into force next year, covers privacy issues fairly comprehensively. It should help clarify the rules on handling personal data.

数据交易

监管机构可以发挥作用[别老can]，尤其是在处理歧视和排斥的问题上。如果根据某人的上网浏览记录决定不向他们出售廉价机票是可以接受的话，那么使用这些数据来拒绝向他们提供医疗保险(例如，假定用谷歌搜索甜甜圈店的人是高风险客户)也合情合理吗?既然亚马逊提供贷款，阿里巴巴拥有支付业务，Facebook已经就信用评级系统申请了专利，监管机构至少应当同样担忧非传统金融机构和金融科技创业公司——它们有时会逃避监管。《欧洲一般数据保护条例》将于明年生效，相当全面地涵盖了隐私问题的各个方面。这应该有助于澄清处理个人数据的规则。

Supervisors are slow, however. It is up to the industry to respond to customers’ demands well before regulators require it. New businesses that give people more control over data, such as digi.me, which lets users share data only with those they want, hold promise. If such tools help users become their own data-brokers, they may be willing to share more data with their mortgage lenders or insurers. But trust will truly be earned only if financial firms, old and new, get ahead of the game and start talking to customers about what’s really going on behind their screens.

然而监管机构行动迟缓，在它们提出要求之前，还得靠行业自身去回应客户的需求。一些新企业如http://digi.me给予客户更多的数据控制权，让他们只和自己愿意与之分享的人共享数据。这些企业的前景看好。如果这些工具帮助用户成为自己的数据代理，用户可能会乐于和抵押贷款机构或保险公司分享更多数据。但只有当金融公司不分新老都先行一步，开始告诉客户在他们的屏幕后面实际做了什么，它们才能真正赢得信任[被动]。