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IT Infrastructure Architect
Privacy Engineering Domains
This resource, developed by the IAPP Privacy Engineering Section Advisory Board and part of the Privacy Engineering Domains series, provides an overview on the role of IT infrastructure architects.
Last updated: July 2025
This resource provides an overview on the role of IT infrastructure architects, whose responsibilities include developing IT infrastructure to ensure data flows between systems have data-use controls in place.
This resource is part of a wider IAPP series on Privacy Engineering Domains, which facilitates a deeper understanding of and collaboration within the increasingly important field of privacy engineering.
Overview of role
The below section highlights key responsibilities, skills and organizational governance related to the role of ROLE. This resource is available as a chart in PDF format here.
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Tasks
Apply privacy by design principles to:
- Support business operations, solution design and development, and implementation to ensure applicable privacy principles are met.
- Ensure systems are maintained and resilient against harms and threats.
- Collaborate on solution design to meet requirements with functional stakeholders, including external vendors and consultants.
- Research and review technologies and systems components and design are adequate to ensure privacy and data protection; articulate mission/vision, capability models and technical architecture in support of securing privacy objectives.
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Professional profile
Technical competencies:
- Business process modeling, IT engineering/computer science, networking/cloud, data science, information security, application infrastructure, systems engineering and programming.
Areas of experience:
- Data science/privacy data systems and platforms
- Artificial intelligence
- Systems/database administration
- Systems and network/cloud architecture
- Security administration
- Solutions development
- Program management
- Business intelligence data
- Technical engineering
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In the organization
Reports to:
- Chief information and security officer
- Chief technology officer (head of infrastructure security or platform engineering)
Works with:
- IT/engineering
- Legal
- Compliance
- Risk assurance
- Business operations
- Manufacturing
- Audit
- Supply-chain
- Procurement
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Strategic drivers
- Ensuring resilience against privacy, data security and cybersecurity risks.
- Building the capability to address increasingly complex challenges related to data transfer and data localization requirements.
- Apply privacy principles such as data necessity and accuracy.
- “The advent of cloud computing and 5G networks and the rapid adoption of AI into IT systems and modern application stacks has created a disaggregated IT systems architecture.”
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Tools and resources
- Cloud services providers, IT vendors, external consultants, software developers, systems integrators.
- Security and privacy certifications training.
- Industry working groups and task forces.
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Getting it right means
- Strong culture of innovation with privacy as a business differentiator and enabler in the marketplace.
- An understanding of privacy controls and industry standards and practices related to privacy and data protection.
- Awareness of developing tools and fields in privacy pertinent to supporting privacy in developing infrastructure.
- Lower attrition of highly skilled engineers who are not only privacy-aware, but able to cross disciplines to develop and add value to the organization.