We know that there is significant potential for the use of these types of data in socio-economic research, but in many cases the cost/benefit ratio has not been measured or compared with other forms of data analysis. these types of data are always cheaper to draw conclusions from.
A recent consultation carried out by the UK’s Cabinet Office, however, implied just that. Part of the text of the consultation said: “it is essential that official statistics and research draws on the wealth of data held by businesses and other bodies outside of the public sector……….the proposal is that a new power be created to broaden the scope of belarus rcs data data that can be requested and allow more modern methods of data collection…..away from outmoded, burdensome and expensive surveys”. The full text of the original consultation document (the source of the quote) is available here. The government response to the consultation is available here.
No mention of the lack of documentation for administrative data; no mention of the lack of consent, no mention of the data quality, or representativeness of the data; no thought to the significant loss in re-use potential. A national statistical organisation may be able to estimate the gender ratio at a low geographical level on the basis of mobile phone records, but they’ll almost certainly never be able to construct usable microdata with the richness of a traditional survey.