In the AI era, data has become both the engine and the fuel driving business decisions, innovation, and competitive advantage. As enterprises seek to future-proof their operations, understanding the taxonomy of data—and how artificial intelligence is altering its availability, quality, and value—has never been more essential. From public and proprietary datasets to synthetic and behavioral data, each data type brings distinct advantages and limitations. As AI tools evolve, so too does the calculus around which types of data offer the most insight, agility, and scalability for businesses.

As a media ecologist and long-time observer of the intersection between technology, leadership, and human decision-making, I’ve spent decades helping leaders recognize how the environments around information shift faster than the information itself. We are in one of those pivotal moments now, as machine learning and generative AI fundamentally alter what data is, how it’s gathered, and what it means to business.

The new data ecosystem

Data is often lumped into monolithic categories, but a more nuanced breakdown reveals the subtle, critical distinctions in how various types of data are sourced and utilized

Public data is information freely available to all, typically from government agencies, academic institutions, and open-source projects. It includes census data, environmental reports, public financial filings, and regulatory databases. While often high in volume, public data is historically underutilized due to access complexity, outdated formats, or lack of contextual integration. AI is changing that. New machine learning models can now ingest, translate, and contextualize public data at scale, turning previously overlooked datasets into dynamic decision tools.

Private or first-party data is proprietary data collected directly by organizations from their customers, platforms, or internal operations. It is often considered the gold standard for personalization and business intelligence because of its specificity and direct relevance. However, the value of private data is increasingly constrained by privacy regulations (like the General Data Protection Regulation and the California Consumer Privacy Act) and the diminishing efficacy of third-party cookies. AI is helping organizations wring more value from their own data by improving predictive analytics, segmentation, and real-time decision-making without overstepping regulatory boundaries.

Third-party data—aggregated by external providers and sold to businesses—once served as a supplement to internal insights. But in today’s environment of rising privacy concerns and reduced browser tracking capabilities, third-party data is losing favor. What’s replacing it? Synthetic data. Synthetic data is artificially generated data that mirrors the statistical properties of real datasets without exposing actual individuals or sensitive information. It’s created using AI techniques like generative adversarial networks (GANs) or advanced simulations. As privacy expectations rise and access to granular behavioral data declines, synthetic data offers a high-potential solution.

Businesses can train AI models on synthetic datasets without risking compliance violations. The technology is still maturing, but its trajectory is clear: synthetic data will become foundational to AI development and testing environments.

Behavioral data, derived from user activity across platforms and devices, is immensely valuable for understanding patterns, preferences, and predictive outcomes. With AI, behavioral data can be mined in real time for insights that were previously invisible. However, its use is increasingly constrained by consent frameworks and platform-level data walls.

The accelerant: AI’s impact on data utility

Artificial intelligence doesn’t just use data—it transforms it. Natural language processing, computer vision, and deep learning allow businesses to convert unstructured data (emails, videos, audio, social posts) into structured formats that are actionable. More importantly, AI turns passive data into predictive intelligence.

Three areas where AI is redefining the value of data:

• Accessibility and cleanliness: AI scrubbing and enrichment tools reduce the time and cost of preparing raw data for analysis. What once took data scientists weeks can now be achieved in hours.
• Speed to insight: AI accelerates not just data analysis, but the translation of data into business decisions. Intelligent dashboards powered by real-time data streams enable adaptive strategy, especially in volatile markets.
• Compliance and security: AI-driven governance systems can automate compliance protocols, flag anomalies, and anonymize sensitive data, mitigating risk while maximizing utility.

Which data types will win in the AI era?

Looking ahead, three data types stand to gain significantly in value due to their alignment with AI capabilities:

-Synthetic data, for its scalability and ethical advantage in training models.

-First-party data, for its accuracy and regulatory safety.

-Public data, for its abundance and now, thanks to AI, its accessibility.

An additional development supercharging the value of first-party data is the rise of secure data clean rooms. These environments enable multiple organizations to combine and analyze their proprietary data sets without exposing personally identifiable information or breaching privacy protocols. Clean rooms empower brands, publishers, and platforms to collaborate on shared insights—fueling more precise targeting, attribution, and customer understanding—while remaining compliant. When paired with AI-driven modeling, these shared data environments unlock powerful network effects that elevate the utility of first-party data far beyond what any single organization could achieve on its own.

Meanwhile, legacy third-party datasets and contextless behavioral tracking will continue to decline in utility unless combined with advanced AI layering.

Why this matters for tech leaders

CIOs, CMOs, and data strategy officers should be reevaluating their entire data infrastructure—not just to keep up with compliance mandates, but to fully capitalize on what AI can unlock. The competitive edge will increasingly belong to those who invest in flexible, multi-source data ecosystems and align them with agile AI systems capable of transforming insight into immediate action.

As we reimagine the role of data in the enterprise, one thing is clear: in the age of intelligent systems, your data is only as valuable as your ability to make meaning from it—at scale, and at speed.

I welcome the opportunity to further this dialogue with technology decision-makers and data leaders. We are entering an age where the combination of human intuition and machine intelligence isn’t just a competitive differentiator—it’s a survival imperative.

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Media ecologist, futurist, and author of The Tao of Leadership.