Data Collection and Changing Attitudes towards Privacy

Jamie Reid has published an insightful article entitled “Finding a Cure for Data Loss” on SecurityFocus. Citing several major data breaches, Jamie highlights the underlying issue: “the demand for privacy has lagged behind the rate at which data has been collected.” But a backlash is on its way.

Currently, people are providing a lot of personal information to a lot of companies. Companies could track customers by Social Insurance Number because customers provided that information. The backlash of customers not providing this information has started. There has been a decline in rewards programs and other services that trade in customer information. These people become an unreachable market. Therefore, even a gradual change in public attitudes towards privacy may have profound economic consequences for many companies.

For companies to assess their data security plans in response to these changing attitudes. Jamie recommends:

1. Acquire consent to use personal information. If withdrawn, the information should be flagged as non-shareable.
2. Conduct a privacy impact assessment on your business to understand the impact of changing attitudes
3. Reduce the amount of personal information collected, stored and shared. In terms of storage, have a cutoff for how long data is stored.

Tags: data storage, data breaches, privacy, information privacy, consent