Disruption for Bangladesh in 2025: Big Data

A data center. Big Data will become the new normal in a few years' time when all businesses and government organisations use large volumes of data to improve what they do and how they do it. Photo: Bloomberg

The year 2024 will be remembered as the year of "the 36-day July". The July movement was joined by students and citizens from all walks of life demanding justice and accountability. During the widespread protests and civil unrest that shook the foundations of the country, even before the nation could deal with its aftermath, severe flooding displaced millions, causing widespread devastation.

The renewed sense of urgency for disaster led to a remarkable display of resilience that united our communities to provide relief and assistance to support one another without any bias or discrimination. 

Many transformative changes followed, starting with the renewed independent judiciary to maintain and uphold the rule of law of the legal system and impressive digital milestones for Bangladesh, merging law with innovation and technology. 

While 2024 has been a year packed with highs, lows, and digital adoption. From record-breaking internet usage to the meteoric rise of AI-powered chatbots, the past year has seen a surge in digital disruption for some of the world's top social media platforms, and for its various connected behaviours, we are witnessing a trend that will completely transform our society. 

No matter what job you are in and no matter what industry you work in, "Big Data" will transform the way banks and shops operate to the way we treat cancer and protect our world from terrorism. 

Big Data will simply become the new normal in a few years' time when all businesses and government organisations use large volumes of data to improve what they do and how they do it. But first things first, let's just look at what "data" and "big data" actually mean. Data is basically a collection of facts, such as numbers, words, measurements, observations, or even just descriptions of things.

Data is increasingly being recognised as an enabler for development and an essential tool during policy-making and monitoring development goals. When effectively managed, data can be used as an asset to support significant development actions such as poverty reduction, food security, mitigating the impact of climate change, and disaster management. Big data refers to large, diverse data sets made up of structured, unstructured, and semi-structured data.

This data is generated continuously and always growing in size, which makes it too high in volume, complexity, and speed to be processed by traditional data management systems. Big data is commonly characterised by three Vs: volume, variety, and velocity. 

Volume refers to the huge amount of data that is generated and stored; variety refers to the different types and sources of data collected, and velocity refers to the speed at which big data must be generated, processed and analysed, or it's not very useful for decision-makers to act quickly. 

How can they disrupt 2025? There are two things that are fuelling this disruption: the fact we have more data on everything and our improved ability to store and analyse any data. Our digitised world leaves a data trail, which means that we have created more data in the past few years than in the entire previous history of mankind.

This data is coming not just from the tens of millions of messages and emails we send each other every second via email, WhatsApp, Facebook, X, etc., but also from the one trillion digital photos we take each year and the increasing amounts of video data we generate. Big data is produced from multiple data sources like mobile apps, social media, emails, transactions, or Internet of Things (IoT) sensors, resulting in a continuous stream of varied digital material.

On top of that, we have data from all the sensors we are now surrounded by. The latest smartphones have sensors to tell where we are (GPS), how fast we are moving (accelerometer), what the weather is like around us (barometer), what force we are using to press the touch screen (touch sensor), and much more. Imagine we have a few hundred billion smartphones in the world, all full of sensors that collect data.

But not only are our phones getting smart; we now have smart TVs, watches, smart meters, gadgets, fridges, tennis rackets, and even smart sunglasses. In fact, by 2026, the number of devices that are connected to the internet is likely to skyrocket, and we will have over 500 trillion devices that are connected to the Internet, increasing the need to use specialised big data tools and systems, which help collect, store, and ultimately translate this data into usable information. 

Google was instrumental in developing distributed computing technology, enabling them to search the Internet. Today, about 100,000 computers are involved in answering a single search query, which takes no more than 0.2 seconds to complete. 

What's more, Big Data storage and analysis technology is now available to rent in a software-as-a-service (SAAS) model, which makes Big Data analytics accessible to anyone, even those with low budgets and limited IT support. Finally, we are seeing amazing advancements in the way we can analyse data.

Algorithms can now look at photos, identify who is on them, and then search the internet for other pictures of that person. Algorithms can now understand spoken words, translate them into written text, and analyse this text for content, meaning, and sentiment (e.g., are we feeling good or are we stressed?), help us understand our health, and predict the future. Couple all this with machine learning and artificial intelligence (the ability of algorithms to learn and make decisions independently). 

Data is no longer a luxury; it provides insights; it's a fundamental necessity in today's world. It reveals patterns, trends, and correlations that would otherwise remain hidden. Data underpins nearly every aspect of modern life, from personal preferences influencing online recommendations to global trends shaping policy decisions. This visibility empowers informed decision-making across all sectors. 

By understanding customer behaviour, predicting market fluctuations, or identifying health risks, organisations and individuals can optimise resources and achieve better outcomes. Data-driven insights allow for more effective strategies, improved efficiency, and progress. 

The World Economic Forum published the Future of Jobs Report 2025, revealing that shifts in technology, the economy, demographics, and the green transition will dramatically reshape labour markets worldwide.

By 2030, 92 million jobs will be displaced, and 170 million new ones will be created, a net increase of 78 million. I am convinced that Big Data, unlike any other trend at the moment, will affect everyone and everything in Bangladesh in 2025.

Data privacy, cybersecurity, and artificial intelligence will be an integral part of the data governance ecosystem made up of policies, laws, practices, behaviours, and technologies that govern the basics of data. 

An ideal data governance system would protect rights, enable innovation, improve transparency, and help bring about democratic, inclusive governance. The next few years will see companies that ignore Big Data be overtaken by those who do not. Companies without plans in place to start using Big Data to improve performance will be left behind

Barrister Tasnuva Shelley is an advocate at the Supreme Court of Bangladesh.

Disclaimer: The views and opinions expressed in this article are those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the opinions and views of The Business Standard.