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Ann Cavoukian, Ph.D. |
PbD Blog at ITBusiness.ca |
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Every year, my office hosts an annual event known as the Privacy by Design (PbD) Challenge where a distinguished group of speakers relate their personal success stories with PbD and the dividends they gained for their organizations. Last year’s event was a great success, attended by over 250 public and private sector business leaders and academics. Since last year, the concept of PbD has grown dramatically and is now an established archetype in the field of privacy protection. For that reason, this year’s event – Privacy by Design: The Gold Standard – will focus on the implementation of new technologies, business practices, and infrastructure in a manner that can deliver tangible results on the promise of PbD. Why Privacy is Good for Business While I often speak about the fallacy of the zero-sum argument that privacy must be sacrificed for the sake of security, I wanted to take the opportunity to also argue against a prevailing view that privacy hinders business – this is a complete fallacy. Too often, organizations – both public and private – protest that implementing serious privacy measures increases operating costs while adding nothing to the value of their business. When they do undertake a program to increase the protection of their customers’ privacy, it’s often because they feel forced to comply with jurisdictional laws. An Introduction to Privacy by Design I have always argued that privacy is the foundation upon which democracy is built. Our right to control the collection, use and disclosure of information about ourselves is the right upon which our other freedoms rest. Thus, to preserve our privacy is to preserve that which we cherish, but often take for granted – the freedom and liberty that define the open society in which we live. It is this understanding that has fuelled my longstanding interest in the privacy rights of individuals, and that has so powerfully cemented my dedication to this cause. In my two decades as a privacy professional, I have seen how the growth of technology has brought new challenges to the protection of privacy. Consumers are now constantly subjected to new forms of data collection from all kinds of businesses. Emerging privacy-invasive technologies such as biometrics, Radio Frequency Identifiers (RFIDs) and video surveillance have intensified the need to address privacy and the methods that may be used to protect it.
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