What’s on your plate these days? What types of privacy problems are surfacing for you? For me, I’m knee-deep in what might be considered privacy impact assessment season. I guess it comes directly after data breach season... 

On the more strategic end of things, I was also lucky enough this week to be brought into discussions by two clients dealing with similar issues. They were both multinational organizations and have pretty sophisticated marketing campaigns. Our discussions concerned the plethora of legal jurisdictions with differing laws on the same subject: e-marketing. The marketers in the room came at it from the perspective of trying to maximize the size and efficiency of their lists. The technologists came from the perspective of what IT resources were needed to pull off these large campaigns. And, not to be outdone, the privacy folks around the table were approaching it as a risk-mitigation exercise — a confusing and difficult one because of the different risks associated with e-marketing around the world. Oh, and did I mention that ePrivacy Regulation being proposed in the EU will shake things up even more?

I came out of the conversations tasked not only with providing expert advice on the Canadian landscape but, more and more, I’m also asked for advice relating to what is going on with the rest of the world. Clearly, privacy is a global issue.

That being said, I’m going to take a few minutes right now to catch up on all things happening here in Canada. I hope you do, as well. After all, we need a sound understanding of what’s going on in our own backyard if we’re going to intellectually analyze and advise on what’s going on with the rest of the world, wouldn’t you agree?