Synthetic Data is a Taonga

Short answer: yes. Synthetic data created from Māori data is Māori data, and it is a taonga. Synthetic data made from non-Māori data also becomes Māori data once it is combined with Māori data to produce results. Making data synthetic does not break its whakapapa.

The reasoning comes from tikanga. Data drawn from Māori people, or anything made with Māori data, keeps a genealogical connection to its source. Generating new records with an algorithm does not sever that connection, any more than anonymisation does. Treating synthetic data as “not about anyone” is a Eurocentric view of data. From a Māori perspective, data carries part of the people it came from.

Key points

• Synthetic data generated from Māori data, anonymised or not, has whakapapa and mātauranga. It is Māori data and a taonga.
• Synthetic data generated from non-Māori data becomes Māori data once it is combined with Māori data to produce results.
• Any synthetic data created by a Māori individual or collective, or using any amount of Māori data, remains Māori data.
• Because it is Māori data, synthetic data is subject to Māori data sovereignty principles and to Te Tiriti o Waitangi. Labelling it “synthetic” does not exempt it.

Why this matters no

Synthetic data is no longer a niche research technique. Māori health research already uses it to compensate for low numbers of Māori participants. AI developers increasingly use it to train and test models where real data is scarce or sensitive. That creates a quiet but serious risk. If synthetic data is treated as free of any connection to Māori, it can be used to build systems that make decisions about Māori, and shared offshore, without any of the protections that apply to the Māori data it was derived from.

Government guidance on generative AI already tells agencies to confirm whether the information they are using counts as Māori data before using it with AI tools. Synthetic data derived from Māori data must pass the same test. If it doesn’t, synthetic generation becomes a loophole: a way to strip Māori data of its tikanga obligations while keeping its value. That would fail the architecture-versus-decoration test. A data governance framework that protects Māori data but exempts its synthetic derivatives treats Māori protections as decoration.

This is not a new questio

Whether data is a taonga has been debated publicly in Aotearoa for years. In 2018 I took part in Stats NZ’s panel He taonga te raraunga? Is data taonga?, which put that question to an expert panel. The panellists did not all agree, and that debate continues. Synthetic data is the next step in the same kōrero. If data is a taonga, its synthetic derivatives inherit that status.

Related reading

• Data is a taonga: a customary Māori perspective
• Treaty of Waitangi/Te Tiriti and Māori Ethics Guidelines for AI, Algorithms, Data and IOT
• Māori Data Sovereignty Principles
• He Tangata, He Karetao, He Ātārangi framework