“Data literacy” is increasingly presented as a necessary condition and desirable feature of the unfolding ‘data revolution”. Although there is evidently partial truth in these views, what ‘data literacy’ exactly means, entails, and is meant to achieve is often left hanging. "Data literacy” is too often simply defined as “the ability to use data”, while in some cases, being data literate means not using data—for example if it has not been collected ethically. This talk will argue that in the 21th Century being ‘data literate’ will be as much a fundamental human capability as a useful professional skillset, both an enabler and marker of human agency.