US retail industry suffers from big data troubles

When it comes to "big data", the first thing people think about is all kinds of social media, telecoms and other technology companies, but another industry that involves intensive user data is retailing.

In this rather traditional industry, "big Data" is mixed with risk and profit. Retail giants are prone to buying data or credit card data for millions or even millions of consumers, but they are riddled with data security management, and profit from selling the data, and because of current accounting standards, are not available to potential investors.

Hackers love supermarkets

In addition to attacking a variety of banking networks or stealing mail passwords, hackers are likely to be the most popular targets for the next number of retailers. Large supermarket chains are all over the world, and millions of customer payment information is stored in the same system, security awareness or resistance to attack level is not comparable to banks or other technology companies. This probably explains why U.S. retail giants have been almost rotated by data theft in recent years, causing tens of millions of of customers ' credit card information to leak.

Just this September, home Depot, the big home chain, became the latest retailer to pay for information stolen by customers. According to preliminary analysis, the leaked incident may have affected the Home Depot company across the United States in 2,200 stores. This means that about 4 million credit cards or card information are stolen.

In addition to Home Depot, recently a series of retailers such as food supermarket chain "super Price Store", American food chain P.f.chang, etc. are hackers steal customer information. Also in September, Goodwill, a charity second-hand store, said its customers ' credit card information was stolen in more than 300 stores.

The invasion of US retailer Target at the end of last year was a huge historical inflection point in the Pay Card industry in recent years. At that time, target company's network was hacked, a total of 40 million customers of the payment card information was stolen.

After the incident, target company was still trying to eliminate residual effects. Information theft has hurt the company's share price and reputation, and Target will need to spend 100 million of billions of dollars in its 1800 stores to enhance its information security measures.

In addition to retail outlets such as restaurants and supermarkets, the hotel industry's data leaks have also left many customers with hair on their heads. The risk of exposure to information leaks in the service industry has left consumers with confidence that businesses can protect personal data strongly.

A profit that cannot be accounted for

The customer's bank payment information poses a risk to the retailer, but the other part is glittering.

The company, which owns 2,600 supermarket chains, records the purchase data for each customer and tracks the purchase history of a total of 5.5 million members. Kroger, after analyzing the data, resold it to suppliers from soda to oatmeal. Consumer-goods producers such as Procter and Gamble and Nestlé are interested in the data, hoping to draw customer preferences to help with product design and marketing.

Some analysts believe Kroger can earn 100 million of dollars a year only by selling the data. Kroger the company to remain silent, just said that they follow the general principles of Accounting. Based on these principles, the company cannot use the data as an asset, nor will it invest in the company by the cost of collecting and analyzing the data.

Kroger companies can rely on these data for additional benefits, but have not really fully exploited the potential value of these data. For example, because it is not possible to reflect the current or future value of large data in the company's earnings, this part of the content is in fact a blind spot in the eyes of investors, often allowing investors to underestimate the company's development potential.

More and more companies are relying on information transactions and large data analysis tools to broaden profitability channels, but how to assess large data as an asset? This is still a blank in the current business community. To evaluate large data, companies need to estimate the shelf life of their data and need to keep track of their value and possible changes at any time. It is easy to value tangible assets, such as factory buildings, but there seems to be no precedent for estimating the potential value of large data.

Intangible assets

The equivalent of half of Europe's GDP

Lennard Nakamura, an economist at the Federal Reserve Bank of Philadelphia, Leonard Nakamura, said in a study that the total intangible assets of all commercial companies were valued at $8 trillion trillion, equivalent to the combined GDP of Germany, France and Italy. These intangible assets include patents, trademarks and copyrights, as well as large data.

The role of these intangible assets in the global economy is becoming increasingly important. For example, in the past few years, such as Google, Apple and Samsung and other technology giants launched a series of mergers and acquisitions, litigation, in essence, revolves around the ownership of the patent. None of these intangible assets appears in the company's financial statements.

"We want more accounting information on intangible assets to better understand how companies are investing in future growth," he said. "Nakamura said.

The US Financial Accounting Standards Board is working to update accounting standards, given the growing reliance on information and intellectual property in today's economic structure. As early as 2002 and 2007, the U.S. Financial Accounting Standards Board has two times on the issue of intangible assets, but each time before the disagreement. It was not until September this year that some of the Committee's advisers raised the issue again.

"The real potential of many companies is not reflected in publicly disclosed information or earnings." "Glen Kernick, manager of investment banking at Glenn Knico Company, said.

(Responsible editor: Mengyishan)