Brazil’s Bold Data Gamble: Paychecks or Privacy?
Brazil’s Bold Data Gamble: Paychecks or Privacy?
Turning data into money sounds empowering,until it becomes a paycheck for the poor to surrender their rights.
Brazil just flipped the script on digital capitalism. Its new pilot, dWallet, lets citizens earn from their data, turning surveillance into salary. Partnering with DrumWave, the government aims to give Brazilians real ownership, making it the first country to trial state-backed, user-controlled data monetization.
But amid praise lies peril: 3 in 10 citizens are functionally illiterate, and critics warn the poor could be manipulated into selling privacy for pennies.
Meanwhile, Brazil’s streets are spawning child influencers monetizing hustle and hardship, some without legal approval. One 14-year-old sells candy for views, earning more than most adults. Platforms profit, but regulation lags.
- Brazil pilots the world’s first citizen-owned data monetization system.
- Child labor laws clash with a booming underage influencer economy.
- The digital divide risks deepening exploitation—masked as empowerment.
The line between agency and exploitation is thinning. Can we build synthetic futures without selling out the most vulnerable?
Read the full article on Rest of World.
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Dr. Mark van Rijmenam
Dr. Mark van Rijmenam is The Digital Speaker, a world-leading futurist and global AI keynote speaker who helps leaders decide what AI, and the technologies that follow it, mean for their business. He speaks to leadership teams at their retreats and to conference audiences worldwide, and his WAVE framework gives them a way of deciding that they keep using long after he has left the room. His Intelligence Age Scorecard measures how ready an organization is across the four WAVE pillars.
He holds a PhD from the University of Technology Sydney, is a Certified Speaking Professional and Global Speaking Fellow, and ranks among the world’s top futurists on the Global Gurus list (#1 in 2025, #3 in 2026). Salesforce named him one of its 16 leading AI voices. He has written six books, most recently Now What? How to Ride the Tsunami of Change, writes the Synthetic Minds newsletter on Substack, and founded Futurwise. Talk to his digital twin on WhatsApp: +1 (830) 463-6967.
