Why firms with an ethical rudder will become leaders

COMPANIES are finding it harder to gain the trust and loyalty of customers at a time when they actually know more about them than ever before. Why is that? Largely because customers don't feel the companies have earned their trust.

In today's digital world, every online click, like and swipe provides data about user interests, preferences, intent and even location to anyone equipped to collect these data swarms; and the growing ubiquity of location-based sensors, facial recognition, and social and mobile computing has made consumers subject to vast, and lucrative, analyses every day. Unless we throw away every device, turn off the Wi-Fi in our homes and shut the blinds, full white-out privacy simply does not exist.

What can be done to close what IDC calls the "consumer trust divide"? Both governments and enterprises have a part to play. Governments around the world and in Asia have begun introducing data protection legislation with which enterprises will have to comply. However, compliance alone isn't enough. With privacy becoming a grey area and trust getting harder to gain, companies are no longer expected to just get the job done, but they also have to do the right thing.