The dark side of customer analytics: the ethics of retailing

Abstract

The main objective of this article is to analyse the dark side of customer analytics and the ethics issues in the retailing industry. Ethics-related issues in retailing began to be discussed and studied primarily in the 1960s. The rising interest in ethical issues in retailing is in line with social concerns and consumer awareness, especially in the 1970s and 1980s. The use of big data in customer analytics is one of the most strategic weapons in the competitive retail environment, especially in terms of systematic examination of customers’ buying behaviour, trend, and pattern will be used to help make business decisions via market segmentation and predictive analytics. The dark side of customer analytics in retailing is mainly related to security and privacy, incentives, risks, data sharing management, and data vulnerabilities that ultimately erode customer confidence and satisfaction level.