Abstract

Novel and emerging technologies can provide users with new kinds and unprecedented amounts of information about themselves, such as autobiographical information, neurodata, health information, or characteristics inferred from online behavior. Technology that provides extensive personal information (PI technology) can impact who we understand ourselves to be, how we constitute ourselves, and indeed who we are. This paper analyzes how PI technology’s external, quantified perspective on us affects identity based on a narrative identity theory. Disclosing the intimate relationship between PI technology and identity sheds light on a whole new range of ethical issues that have received insufficient attention so far. Personal information provided by technology is not just information that belongs to individuals but also changes them.