We want to put people in control of their finances. We have the technology and a start-up pursuing that goal. HapNav, the Happiness Navigator. Can we succeed?
We want to re-make the wealth cyberspace for people. We want to fix some of the problems that have handicapped the financial industry for decades. Too much power and too much personal data, reside with the “product silos” – the big Product Providers and their Distributors. People are fed up with the lack of controls.
“I spent my entire career championing information sharing, openness and personal empowerment online — but I have become increasingly concerned as power in financial services is weighted against the individual and stacked in favour of providers and their distributors.” Steve Conley, Founder CEO HapNav Ltd and the Academy of Life Planning.
We need a push to give individuals greater control over their data.
We need to offer a portal where people can use a single sign-on for any financial service or product and personal data to be stored in “pods,” or personal online data stores, controlled by the user.
That is why this new, updated wealth tech app, HapNav, will enable the kind of person-to-person sharing and collaboration that has helped make the wealth industry so successful over the years, while leaving the user in control.
It is rather like in the NHS. Imagine addressing the long-standing problem of incompatible medical records. What if the NHS could give everyone an “All About Me” form with various doctors and other service providers able to update that record even as it remains in the user’s control? Now imagine that for your finances!
Regulators worldwide have voiced similar complaints. The product silos are facing tougher new rules where they are challenged on locking clients into service through control of data, then tapping into assets and charging fees without delivering services.
Our answer to the problem is technology that gives individuals more power.
“Pods,” personal online data stores, are a key technical ingredient to achieve that goal. The idea is that each person could control his or her own data — cash flows modelled, open banking platforms, product comparison sites, risk metric questionnaire — in an individual data safe, typically a sliver of server space.
Companies could gain access to a person’s data, with permission, through a secure link for a specific task like processing an investment application or delivering a personalised ad. They could link to and use personal information selectively, but not store it.
Our vision of personal data sovereignty stands in sharp contrast to the harvest-and-hoard model of the big product companies and their distributors.
This is about making markets thrive. Personal data in pods can be linked with public and private data to create new applications. Start-ups can play a crucial role in accelerating the adoption of this new technology. Technology has become faster and smarter — and pressure on the big tech companies is mounting.
So why not offer individuals better ways to control their data.
Our goal is to improve wealth and wellbeing for the client. And it is a fundamental change in how we share information in financial services.
This is a fix-it project. Our long view is a thriving decentralized marketplace, fuelled by personal empowerment and collaboration.
This is not a pipe dream. This is already happening!
Check out what Sir Tim Berners-Lee, the grandfather of the world-wide-web has to say in the links below.
For more information visit: HOME (hapnav.com)
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| He Created the Web. Now He’s Out to Remake the Digital World. Tim Berners-Lee wants to put people in control of their personal data. He has technology and a start-up pursuing that goal. Can he succeed? |
| Father of the Web Tim Berners-Lee prepares ‘do-over’ Sir Tim Berners-Lee, the British computer scientist who was knighted for inventing the internet navigation system known as the World Wide Web, wants to re-make cyberspace once again. |
Academy of Life Planning 