Your round-up of the latest, greatest data stories

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The Ministry of Housing, Communities & Local Government (MHCLG) has announced reforms to the Planning and Infrastructure Act, which now mean that datacentres can skip local planning and go straight to Whitehall for sign-off, with no statutory requirement for consultation beforehand. Three sites have already been waved through this way. One civil servant warned at the time that classing datacentres as critical national infrastructure would likely stifle local opposition. Rather handily, only 7% of UK adults say they oppose datacentres. Although, as we saw a couple of weeks ago in TWID, 89% of UK adults admit they are unfamiliar with what a datacentre actually is. Where datacentres are proposed, people do seem to know what they are, and they aren’t altogether keen on them. Almost 5,000 people signed a petition opposing a scheme near Norwich, hundreds packed a meeting in Great Torrington to fight a £13 billion data centre and battery storage development in Devon, while Reading residents grilled developers over water, noise and gas power plans. In Scotland, the gap between the promise of datacentres and reality is starting to resemble the Great Glen Fault, and locals are not impressed. DataVita’s pledge of 1GW of on-site renewable for the flagship Lanarkshire “growth zone” looks unlikely to deliver on its numbers, the job figures appear to be lifted and inflated from a different site, and now the Scottish government is considering a full moratorium on new Scottish datacentres, putting a key part of the UK’s AI strategy at risk. The government wanted growth zones. What it's got, increasingly, is a power struggle.

Three years on from one of the messiest data breaches in recent memory, 23andMe’s victims are finally going to get paid. A bankruptcy judge in California has ordered Chrome Holding, the company that took over 23andMe after it collapsed in 2025, to part with a cool $46.75 million in compensation for the hack that exposed genetic profiles, health markers and family history data on as many as 6.9 million people. While the hack only reached about 14,000 accounts, the whole mapping family trees lark meant that millions were affected as a result. The breach led to a £2.3 million fine by the Information Commissioner's Office in the UK, while the Attorney general of California sued the company, claiming it "lied to consumers about the severity of its 2023 data breach." 23andMe was once valued at $6 billion, but never turned a profit.

Meta’s new AI generator was released this week and was immediately under fire. The tool lets anyone tag a public Instagram user and use their photo to generate a new AI image. Without their permission. Users can opt out, but it’s on by default and people have to actively turn it off. Critics aren’t impressed, with one tech justice advocate labelling it "an obvious recipe for disaster", while others have pointed to Meta’s less-than-impeccable track record with users and their data.

It’s your last chance to grab tickets to hear our Executive Chair Prof Sir Nigel Shadbolt cut through some of the critical issues in AI on Thursday 16 July, 16:00-17:00, so don’t miss out. And it’s a final reminder for our webinar with the EDM Association on Tuesday 14 July 15:00 BST, when you can hear from Sir Tim Berners-Lee as we launch a new community of practice putting Solid into action. Also coming up, we have Rowenna Fielding discussing her data framework for improved data governance on Thursday 30 July 12:00-13:00. Get your tickets now!

And finally… while England beat Mexico 3-2 in the last sixteen of the World Cup in the early hours of Monday morning, registration data collected by more than 12,000 state schools in England suggest that 332,000 fewer pupils were in school than the previous Monday. Three lions, three goals, and more than 300,000 very unconvincing sick notes.

David and Jo

PS: Our Director of Research Prof Elena Simperl has joined Mind’s commission into AI and mental health. Check out this post to find out more. 

From the outside world

UK guts planning red tape so datacenters can bypass the neighbors faster

The Register

Overhaul of process could give NIMBYs one year less to complain.

Government gives data centers the ability to skirt building regulations and local authority oversight by applying for fast-track ‘national importance’ status

Techradar

Data centers will be able to dodge local planning regulations and council oversight.

Why are thousands of people opposing a new data centre?

BBC

Nearly 5,000 people have signed a petition against plans for a data centre in countryside close to Norwich. What exactly is proposed, and what do opponents and backers of the scheme say?

Massive data centre public events postponed

BBC
The company behind £13bn plans for a data centre and battery energy storage site in north Devon has postponed a series of public consultation days.

Climate impact among proposed data centre concerns

BBC

The climate impact of a proposed data centre was among concerns shared by locals at a public consultation.

Revealed: landmark Scottish AI project has no prospect of meeting renewables promise

The Guardian

Exclusive: Government and developers privately acknowledged Lanarkshire datacentre site had power provision ‘issue’

‘It’s smoke and mirrors’: hope turns to fear in Scottish village chosen for AI datacentre

The Guardian

Suspicions grow in Lanarkshire that local people have been misled on supposed benefits of the huge development.

What are Britain’s AI growth zones and are the plans feasible or ‘complete bunk’?

The Guardian

Lanarkshire datacentre run by renewables and creating thousands of jobs not achievable by 2030, Guardian investigation finds.

Victims of 23andMe data breach to get $47m payout, judge rules

BBC

Victims of a 2023 data hack at genetics testing company 23andMe are set to receive a multi-million payout from the firm.

Outcry as Meta lets users make AI images from public Instagram profile pics

BBC

Meta is facing a backlash over its new AI tool Muse Image, which can generate pictures using other people's profile pictures without telling them.

Meta just launched a new AI generator, Muse Image, and users are already pushing back over use of their photos

Tech Crunch

Meta on Tuesday unveiled Muse Image, its new AI image generator built by Meta Superintelligence Labs, the company’s dedicated AI unit. The feature, which was internally code-named Mango, is now available for free through the Meta AI app, as well as on Instagram Stories and WhatsApp.

More than 300,000 pupils estimated absent after England World Cup win

The Guardian

Exclusive: Initial figures are yet to be confirmed by DfE, which said schools were ‘at the heart’ of the celebration.

One copy of the truth – Sir Tim Berners-Lee on Solid and the future of enterprise data

Free webinar, Tuesday 14 July 3-4pm BST, book now

Join Sir Tim Berners-Lee, inventor of the World Wide Web, and John Bruce, co-founder and chief executive of Inrupt, as they discuss what Solid is, why it was developed and why this matters even more now with the rapid pace of AI development.

From the ODI

In conversation with Sir Nigel Shadbolt

Free webinar, Thursday 16 July 4-5pm BST, book now

Join us for an exclusive event with Sir Nigel Shadbolt, one of the world’s leading authorities on artificial intelligence and open data.

Solid World

Free webinar, Wednesday 29 July, 9-10am BST, book now

With AI moving so fast, there is barely time to take advantage of all the features introduced at Solid.

Data Ethics Professional #14: A smarter way to spot data & AI harms

Free webinar, Thursday 30 July, 12 -1pm BST, book now

Join Rowenna Fielding, privacy, data protection & data ethics geek for hire, as she discusses her data framework for improved data governance.

Data Ethics Professional #15: Can we share confidential health data in the public interest?

Free webinar, Thursday 24 September, 2-3pm BST, book now

This session will explore the long‑standing question of how doctors and nurses approach decisions about sharing confidential patient information in the public interest.

The Week in Data

The Week in Data is our weekly round up of the latest news in data. If you haven't already, you can subscribe here. 

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