Why China decided on centralized market places for data trading?

"Data is just like crude. It’s valuable, but if unrefined it cannot be used. It has to be changed into gas, plastic, chemicals, etc., to create a valuable entity that drives profitable activity; so must data be broken down, analyzed for it to have value." -- Michael Palmer, Association of National Advertisers This was written in a blog post back in 2006. It has been repeated and amplified, first by marketers, then by entrepreneurs, and now by business leaders and policymakers. And just like oil, we're running out of data, especially high-quality data. Right now, there are problems in sharing data. How is the data shared, and what protections are in place?