Like oil, data needs to be processed. But unlike oil, data is not a substance found in nature at all. It is the by-product of social interactions that are mediated by digital technologies, a by-product that is captured and processed by a third party that is not intimately involved with the people in the interaction and indeed can operate at many removes from them through the market for selling data. The first use of the metaphor of data as the “new oil” is attributed to Clive Humby, the conceptual grandfather of the loyalty shopping-club card, who in 2006 said, “Data is the new oil. It’s valuable, but if unrefined it cannot really be used. It has to be changed into gas, plastic, chemicals, et cetera to create a valuable entity that drives profitable activity; so must data be broken down, analyzed for it to have value.” Data must thus be presented as an ownerless resource that can be exploited only by certain parties (what Julie Cohen calls data refineries).

Nick Couldry & Ulises A. Mejias, The Costs of Connection, loc. 287