More Than a Certification Scheme: Information Banks in Japan Under Changing Norms of Data Usage

The Japanese certification scheme for information banks has recently received attention as an important example in the regulation of data intermediaries. Recognizing that the certification scheme has fallen short of expectations in the short term, this chapter explains why information banks matter for processing customer data in Japan and as theoretically rich examples of data intermediaries more generally. This is the first study tracing the information bank concept to its origins in the 2000s, providing sufficient context on how the certification scheme came into existence in the late 2010s. By enacting a diffractive genealogy, it becomes clear that the certification scheme tried but failed to strike a balance between the interests of companies and their prospective customers. Privacy concerns were receiving attention internationally from 2013 to 2019, at a time when the Japanese government tried to increase the circulation of data among private and public entities. In spite of this, the model of a regional information bank is considered to be promising especially when deployed in combination with Mobility as a Service (MaaS). Smaller information bank solutions that did not pursue certification have been successfully rolled out in other scenarios. As the adoption of data technology has significantly gained momentum through the COVID-19 pandemic internationally, restrictions on the use of health information in the certification scheme have been relaxed. Medical information banks are now deployed in “special health zones” with selective support, such that market mechanisms among certified information banks will likely remain ineffective in the short- to mid-term. The long-term success of the information bank concept nationally would be eased if Japan succeeds in promoting Data Free Flow with Trust (DFFT) for less sensitive data internationally.