想要提高托福閱讀能力，我們一定要在日常生活中有意識地增加英語閱讀量，提升語感和熟練度，這其中比較常用也比較方便地一個方式就是利用各類英文報刊雜志文章進行精讀與泛讀練習。下面我們來看一篇經濟學人文章：為我們服務的銀行家應該成為我們的社交好友嗎?

Data, financial services and privacy

Should our bankers be our Facebook friends?

數據、金融服務和隱私

為我們服務的銀行家應該成為我們Facebook上的好友嗎?

DONALD TRUMP’s health-insurance premiums could soon go up, and not just because of his love of burritos. Data-crunchers計算器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. 特朗普的醫療保費可能很快就會上漲，這不僅僅是因為他特別愛吃墨西哥卷餅。數據研究公司已經發現，人們在推特上的負面言論和他們死于心臟病的風險之間存在關聯。你Facebook上好友的受教育程度，或是你在手機上的活動，能夠幫助判斷你償還貸款的可能性。金融機構正越來越滿懷好奇地搜羅[別老seek]客戶數字生活的方方面面。

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.這些都是“加劇的金融業數據軍備競賽”的一部分，咨詢公司韋萊韜悅的瑪格達·羅曼達·薩拉索拉表示。該公司稱，去年沒有哪個行業運用的大數據比金融業更多。銀行和保險公司過去通常只依賴客戶和征信機構告訴它們的信息，但如今，網站和手機銀行應用讓它們能更接近客戶，獲得更多個人信息。不那么傳統的信息來源也很流行。社交媒體上的個人信息、網絡瀏覽、會員卡、電話定位跟蹤都能發揮作用。在一次試驗中，美國的主要信用評分機構FICO發現某人在Facebook狀態中使用的詞語能幫助預測他的信用度(提示：避免出現“大醉”字眼)。甚至表情和語調也可以用來研究風險。

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[邏輯] those advertised.信賴此道的人們認為如此網羅數據將能讓客戶以更低的價格得到更好的產品。但消費者權益保護組織指責這一行業故意模糊自己的意圖。金融家和賭徒不一樣，他們總是使用數據。但大多數人在他們接受新應用的條款或者點擊關閉煩人的cookie信息時，并不知道他們向誰泄露了什么信息，以及這些信息將被用于何處。根據歐盟委員會的統計機構歐盟統計局的數據，81%的歐洲人感覺他們的在線數據并非完全由自己控制;69%的歐洲人擔心各家公司可能會將他們的數據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[邏輯]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. 監管機構對此表示關切[詞匯翻譯]。去年9月，英國金融市場行為監管局表示，它擔心大數據可能導致對高風險客戶開價過高，讓他們無力[邏輯]購買保險。去年5月，歐洲銀行管理局(European Banking Authority)警告，如果不安全的數據使用侵蝕了信任，金融業的誠信就可能面臨風險。在12月，歐洲監管機構列舉了對于隱私和道德問題的擔憂。它們如今正在與金融界商議，看是否要出臺更嚴格的規則。

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. 數據能夠改進預測，比如預測某人是否會生病或開車撞上大樹。好的算法比核保人員更快速且低價。保險公司也宣稱它們對客戶了解越多，就越能幫助他們改變壞習慣。保險業堅稱有了更多的客戶數據就能提供“定制化”[詞匯翻譯]產品，例如可向準備蹦極的人發出警告，告知其壽險保單并不涵蓋這一項目，并向他提供附加保險項目。如果銀行去跟蹤客戶的行蹤，就能保護他們免受欺詐。這些技術還能幫助金融體系之外的人獲得金融服務。對于6400萬沒有充足信用記錄的美國人，以及全世界約20億沒有銀行賬戶的人來說，這會是個好消息。

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.” 但是批評者擔心過度的數據分析實際上會加劇金融體系對一些人的排斥。風險最高的客戶，還有那些不上網的人，可能會被金融體系以高價拒之門外。這一行業對復雜和專有的算法(輸入給持續學習的機器)依賴越多，客戶和監管機構就越難搞清[別老figure out]楚為什么客戶會被拒絕。而且算法可能會出錯。雙語人士的搜索歷史[小詞活用]可能看起來難以捉摸，社會工作者的位置跟蹤可能顯示出一種高風險的生活狀態。此外，國際隱私組織(Privacy International)的費雷德里克·凱休納(Frederike Kaltheuner)稱，既然不清楚判斷是如何做出的，“你可能就會陷入卡夫卡式的困境，被隨意歸入一類，既不知道原因也無法脫身。”

卡夫卡困境：在西方文化里面，有一個專門的用語叫做卡夫卡式的困境(Kafkaesque predicament)，卡夫卡是一個非常典型的處于“邊緣時代”的“邊緣人”，他出生成長于捷克，但卻是純粹的奧地利人，他是商人的兒子，但卻疏遠數字和計算，他是猶太人，但卻遠離自己的出身，在他生活的大時代，也就是20世紀前夜，奧地利正處于一個混亂不堪的拐點，作為奧匈帝國的中心，奧地利在文學，音樂，建筑，心理學等方面無比的繁榮，勛伯格，弗洛伊德，維特根斯坦等大師都是出于這個時期，但是與之形成劇烈反差的是整個帝國卻已經處于崩潰的邊緣，與之相配套的舊有的社會結構和價值體系開始逐步瓦解，信仰的危機導致的是全社會范圍內的失調和無序，絕望和悲觀的情緒在整個帝國震蕩蔓延，而這種無力的碎裂感在作為一個邊緣人，作為一個找不到歸屬感的卡夫卡身上會表現的更加突出，我們能從他的代表作《審判》和《變形記》里面看到這種心靈在混亂無序扭曲狀態之下巨大的煎熬和焦慮。——喵大歪樓

Yet privacy is a fluid[小詞活用] 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. 然而隱私是一個不斷變化的概念。去年咨詢公司安永的調查顯示，如果能得到一些回報，大約有一半熟練操作數字通信的客戶都樂意和銀行分享更多數據。這也取決于具體情況。當英國零售商樂購根據會員卡數據向購物者提供折扣，供他們購買心儀之物時，沒什么人對此感到困擾。但使用同樣的數據來計算保費時(它確實也這樣做了)，很多人都感到駭人。

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. 要讓客戶滿意，關鍵并不在于行為合法，而在于了解哪里是他們所認為的“禁區”。在網上，人們在不知情的情況下對一切事情表示同意。但如果用戶知道自己的數據被出售或者用于意料之外的方面，他們就會有受騙以及被窺視之感。零售商也在努力應對這一問題，但客戶希望銀行能更尊重他們的隱私，戰略咨詢公司科爾尼的托爾斯滕·艾斯特說。

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.

數據交易

監管機構可以發揮作用[別老can]，尤其是在處理歧視和排斥的問題上。如果根據某人的上網瀏覽記錄決定不向他們出售廉價機票是可以接受的話，那么使用這些數據來拒絕向他們提供醫療保險(例如，假定用谷歌搜索甜甜圈店的人是高風險客戶)也合情合理嗎?既然亞馬遜提供貸款，阿里巴巴擁有支付業務，Facebook已經就信用評級系統申請了專利，監管機構至少應當同樣擔憂非傳統金融機構和金融科技創業公司——它們有時會逃避監管?！稓W洲一般數據保護條例》將于明年生效，相當全面地涵蓋了隱私問題的各個方面。這應該有助于澄清處理個人數據的規則。

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.

然而監管機構行動遲緩，在它們提出要求之前，還得靠行業自身去回應客戶的需求。一些新企業如http://digi.me給予客戶更多的數據控制權，讓他們只和自己愿意與之分享的人共享數據。這些企業的前景看好。如果這些工具幫助用戶成為自己的數據代理，用戶可能會樂于和抵押貸款機構或保險公司分享更多數據。但只有當金融公司不分新老都先行一步，開始告訴客戶在他們的屏幕后面實際做了什么，它們才能真正贏得信任[被動]。