Zoom, the videoconferencing platform on everyone’s lips this month, has had an roller coaster of a first quarter. As remote working became the norm for hundreds of millions, the company rapidly emerged as a favorite in the United States, where its simplicity and video quality made it stand out from competitors. Its daily usage swelled… Read More
Very often, we hear clients or businesses express the idea that “we want to give our customers control over the privacy of their data, and that sounds good, but making it a reality is much more complicated.” That’s a fair assessment — operationalizing privacy is something that companies in the U.S. have a difficult time… Read More
The Internet is a risky place for “expertise.” Because it is both a platform and a megaphone, it creates its own multiplier effect for whatever you put into it. If the arguments of the last few years have proven anything, it’s that even a poorly concocted lie spreads far faster than a well-explained truth, largely… Read More
One recent trend that makes privacy professionals very nervous is the “what’s my DNA say about me” fad. You swab your cheek, mail it off to a lab, and presto: you learn that you’re 99% Irish/Scottish and 1% Pacific Islander with a high chance of getting appendicitis. Obviously, unlocking the mysteries of our ancestry is… Read More
We spend an enormous amount of time talking about the benefits of data partnerships but, of course, they aren’t without their risks. No one enters into a business relationship assuming that everything will go exactly as planned (without serious problems later, anyway). But how do you identify ways to protect your business, your data, and… Read More
The Internet went into full “give me a Drudge Report siren” mode last week about Facebook’s announcement that it anticipates a fine of three to five billion dollars from the FTC in the coming months. The fine, a result of Facebook’s violation of a 2011 consent decree with the Commission related to privacy practices, tracking,… Read More
The longer you spend in data-oriented businesses, the more you notice a funny thing about the language used to describe data sets and their uses. While, early on, the language sounds a lot like what you’d use to describe currency (“valuable,” “fungible,” “velocity,”), eventually it all starts to sound like you’re talking about food (“organic,”… Read More
One of the questions we hear most frequently is “what are we doing wrong?” We almost always try to flip that question around into “what can we do better,” because we’re big believers in the notion that providing goals, rather than chastising, creates the right kind of mindset about data privacy and managing a data… Read More
Transparency is one of the principles driving recent developments in data privacy and data security. We’ve spent a lot of time discussing how important it is to be open with consumers and data subjects, to give them a clear idea of how their data is used, and why. The primary reason for this is to… Read More
One of the most popular memes in recent years has been the “distracted boyfriend” meme. The coverage has been amazing, including the identification of an 18th Century equivalent painting. One of the most striking things about the meme is that the presumably current girlfriend has a similar look to the presumably new girl that is… Read More