Today is Data Privacy Day, a global event recognized in over 50 countries to promote data privacy and protection best practices.
As society continues to ‘go digital,’ personal data is a goldmine for businesses. This doesn’t mean it’s a bad thing necessarily. It helps make the consumer experience better, and in some contexts like medical, can even save lives.
But there are vast swaths of people who have no idea where their data is – or how it’s used. Data Privacy Day (or Data Protection Day as it’s called in Europe) aims to fix that.
In honor of the day, we thought we’d share some of the best insights out there. But first…
What is Data Privacy Day?
Data Privacy Day promotes events and activities that:
- Advance concepts associated with data protection and privacy
- Promote individual control over personally identifiable information (PII)
- Encourage compliance with privacy laws and regulations
- Stimulate the development of privacy-supporting technology tools
- Create positive dialogues among privacy stakeholders.
Europe is the trailblazer when it comes to data privacy, and it’s no different with education. The Council of Europe initiated Data Protection Day in 2007 – two years before the U.S. launched Data Privacy Day.
Who is Data Privacy Day for?
Everyone! Modern information technology and information security are now digital – and evolving so fast that it’s a challenge for anyone to keep up. There’s a mountain of education and training work to be done for Internet users, businesses, governments, press, NGOs, and academia. A critical goal of Data Privacy Day is to encourage collaboration among all of these stakeholders.
Hot Off the Press
Here are some highlights from this year’s online articles focused on Data Privacy Day:
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Intelligent CIO: Heather Gantt-Evans, SailPoint CISO, urges companies to embed customer privacy as a core value and communicate that fact via customer-facing messaging.
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Consumer Reports: Encourages you to ask questions – a lot of questions – and demand answers!
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PYMNTS: Apple celebrates Data Privacy Day by releasing a new feature called App Tracking Transparency.
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Psychology Today: Natalia Kucirkova asks that we consider the threat of data privacy infringements on our children as they participate in online education.
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Slate: Prof Firmin DeBrabander, author of Life After Privacy, argues that personal privacy depends on creating civic organizations devoted to the same.
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TechRepublic: Rob Price of Snow Software says that many businesses do not understand that they are responsible for protecting their data – even when it is in the cloud.
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Security Brief Asia: According to Forrester, 54% of survey respondents wish they had more privacy protections in the workplace.
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The Scotsman: 57% of Brits were shocked and angry that tech giants could share their personal data without their permission.
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Help Net Security: Andrius Ulenskas asks you to pause and think about how many smart devices are listening to you right now.
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Digital Journal: Dr. Tim Sandle says that companies must offer a better mechanism to gain consumer consent when it comes to sharing personal data.
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Dark Reading: Maxine Holt of Omdia says that we shouldn’t forget about Artificial Intelligence's (AI’s) role in protecting our data privacy.
Data Privacy is Our Mission
VGS is on a mission to protect the world’s data. Providing essential security and compliance infrastructure, VGS enables startups and enterprises to focus on their core business instead of compliance and regulatory overhead. VGS customers enjoy a Zero Data™ approach to information security, retaining the value of sensitive data without the cost and liability of securing it themselves.
To learn more about how we can protect your customers’ sensitive data, request a demo or talk to us today.
