E65: 5 Things You Should Know About Your Privacy with Dr. Ann Cavoukian

Dr. Ann Cavoukian is recognized as one of the world's leading privacy experts. She is currently the Distinguished Expert-in-Residence, leading the Privacy by Design Centre of Excellence at Ryerson University. Her Privacy by Design framework is now the International Standard and has been translated into 39 languages.

 

Listen to Episode 1: Privacy, the foundation of your freedom featuring Dr. Ann Cavoukian and Episode 28: Insiders Guide to GDPR & turning it into a competitive advantage with Dr. Ann Cavoukian

Episode Overview:

 

The elephant in the room about her resignation from the smart city Toronto project and how the world reacted. Ann also talked about the places where our identity is taken that we didn't even know She also talked about all the different things that are coming into play and other new things that we could look forward to this 2019 Ann shared some tools that we should be using and the questions that we should be asking when it comes to our privacy.

Positive expectation for privacy in 2019:

In 2018 the European Union, the General Data Protection Regulation came into effect and it is  raising the bar into privacy and data protection all around the world. It returns control back to the data subjects so that individuals should be in control of their information. It also strengthen privacy dramatically and for the first time, it includes Dr. Ann’s Privacy by Design Framework.

 

Countries all around the world want to be in compliance to this new EU law because they want to engage in trade.

 

There had been a dramatic growth in surveillance in the past year, tracking on all of our activities which is outrageous. The good news is that there had been a real reaction against it in the part of the consumers. In fact, 90% of consumers are concerned with their privacy and 92% are concerned about the lack of control for personal information.

The story on why Ann resigned from her role on Sidewalk Lab:

“The absolute no break in this deal is we have to de-identify data at source.”

 

The minute data is collected from the censored and all the emerging technology that are going to be in place in the envision smart city 24/7, there will be able to obtain consent from people because technology is always on. The minute the sensors collect some data, right there at source it should be de-identified. In that way, they will still have a lot of data but it will not be linked to any identifiable individuals so that the privacy harms will be removed.

 

Sidewalk Labs wanted the Privacy By Design embedded into the smart city that is why they hired Ann but there are a number of parties were not happy being the Sidewalk Labs being the only body to govern the use of the data that they have collected even though that it was going to be de-identified.

 

In response to that, Sidewalk Labs created the Civic Data Trust. The intention of the Civic Data Trust is for Sidewalk Labs to be able to govern the body of the data. There are a number of bodies which will be involved in delivering the data such as IT companies, Waterfront Toronto and different levels of government.

 

In that way, multiple parties will have a say in the data but then Sidewalk Labs will be able to control what they do with the data collected and encourage them to de-identify the data at source however they can’t insist that they do that.

 

And the minute Dr. Ann Cavoukian heard that, she knew she had to walk away. The reason of this is because the minute that they impose it as a must, it is not going to happen because there are thousands of identifiable data and everybody will just be asking for the same access to the data.

The Issue on Statistics Canada:

“Privacy forms a foundation of our freedom” - Ann Cavoukian

 

Statistics Canada went to all major bank to collect all of our very sensitive financial information which includes:

Credit History Bank Statements Payments Bills And more

 

The banks refused to give these data to Stats Canada and also said that they will de-identify the data and will give data that was requested but will also make sure that all personal identifiers are stripped. However, Stats Canada said NO.

 

The reason that Stats Canada doesn’t want this kind of data is because they wanted an identified datas so that they can match it with the other information or data that they have.

Things that are going on that we may not know about:

The Growth in Facial Recognition There are facial recognition anywhere we go and the problem is, we don’t know that it is taking place. One of the biggest issue on this case is identity theft. The Issues on DNA Tests Our DNA is our most sensitive personal information. This also includes your parents, children and families information.

What Questions Should We Ask To Make Sure That We are Protected:

The minute you raise your concerns about your privacy to the seller you will get a good response because they are getting more people who are asking for their privacy in terms of transaction online and offline. Just ask the question and let them know that you don’t want your personal information to be used in any purpose other than completing the purpose of that transaction. When using search engines, use Duckduckgo.com because in any searching you do, they will not share in any third party.

Ann is also working on a Smart Data Agent which is a software agent that will go out and act on your behalf. All the data that is being make in terms of your request using the smart data agent is encrypted, the search that it engages in is totally secured and it doesn’t stay in the cloud.

For the first time ever, Canada’s privacy laws for The Personal Information Protection and Electronic Documents Act (PIPEDA) is no longer equivalent to the new law in the EU, the GDPR which is also a real blow because we enjoy a same equivalent of privacy laws. Dr. Ann Cavoukian’s Privacy by Design is also included.