Are you looking for quotes on privacy that speak to the state of digital privacy in 2019?
From interviews at our SecureWorld conferences to bold statements on privacy made around the globe, here are insightful comments you can use for your next presentation on privacy. Or share this article with peers to start a group discussion on this important topic.
10 quotes on the state of privacy in 2019
1. Apple CEO Tim Cook, on how a lack of privacy means our own information is used against us:
"Our own information is being weaponized against us with military efficiency. Every day, billions of dollars change hands and countless decisions are made on the basis of our likes and dislikes, our friends and families, our relationships and conversations, our wishes and fears, our hopes and dreams. These scraps of data, each one harmless enough on its own, are carefully assembled, synthesized, traded and sold."
2. Kalinda Raina, Head of Global Privacy, Sr. Director, LinkedIn, during #DataPrivacyDay2019, on how privacy is a shared responsibility now:
"Data privacy has become something that is not just for the lawyers anymore. At LinkedIn we call it a culture of privacy because it's not just the lawyers' responsibility, our job is to help interpret the laws, but it's really the responsibility of everybody at the company. As a data-driven company [LinkedIn], that's an important thing for every employee to understand and get a sense of. So a lot of the work that we do here at LinkedIn is to make sure everyone feels that culture of privacy and that they are aware of the responsibilities we have."
3. Lothar Determann, partner with Baker McKenzie and privacy law professor, on the impact of the CCPA (California Consumer Privacy Act), in an interview at a SecureWorld conference:
"We are at a time right now where the sharing of information is more important than ever before. We practice very open business models, open source code licensing, open data, maybe open cars with connected vehicles that have to be built more modular, we need to train artificial intelligence with data, we have various new models of data monetization that have really jumped progress in the information technology sector.
And so there is a lot of sharing going on and it’s being encouraged and is necessary for certain business purposes. And now, this law restricts the sharing with very expansive disclosure obligations and also requirements to give individuals a choice whether the data is being shared under the circumstances. And companies have to prepare for this."
4. U.S. Supreme Court Justice Brett Kavanaugh, before he was on the Supreme Court, on U.S. citizen privacy versus surveillance through widespread metadata collection:
"In my view, the Government’s metadata collection program is entirely consistent with the Fourth Amendment. Even if the bulk collection of telephony metadata constitutes a search, cf. United States v. Jones, 132 S. Ct. 945, 954-57 (2012) (Sotomayor, J., concurring), the Fourth Amendment does not bar all searches and seizures. It bars only unreasonable searches and seizures. And the Government’s metadata collection program readily qualifies as reasonable under the Supreme Court’s case law."
5. Privacy is not absolute, according to a 2018 privacy statement by the Five Eyes group of nations, comprised of the United States, the United Kingdom, Canada, Australia, and New Zealand. Says the statement:
"Privacy laws must prevent arbitrary or unlawful interference, but privacy is not absolute. It is an established principle that appropriate government authorities should be able to seek access to otherwise private information when a court or independent authority has authorized such access based on established legal standards."
6. Karen Zacharia, Chief Privacy Officer at Verizon, on #DataPrivacyDay2019, about why U.S. companies need a national privacy policy and what they need from it:
"I think in the United States it's really important to have a consistent regime. That means one regime that applies to all players in the ecosystem that is enforced at the federal level by the Federal Trade Commission. I think it's important the regime be very flexible, things are changing so quickly and we don't want Congress to pass a law that next year is out of date.
I think it's really important that it has meaningful protections for consumers, so it needs to require companies to be transparent in how they use information and what information is collected it also means we have to give consumers meaningful choices and not just check the box type choices. And finally, any privacy legislation should have some kind of safe harbor provision in it so that companies understand that if they take certain steps, what they are doing is consistent with the law."
7. Rebecca Herold, SecureWorld conference keynote and CEO of The Privacy Professor, on how the Internet of Things is stealing our privacy and creating corporate risks many organizations are unaware of:
"Consider this: If you have 100 employees, and they each use an average of two smart devices within your business processing environment, you’ve just created at least another 200 data storage areas. Add in all the third parties that are getting copies of the data, and that number exponentially increases. How can organizations safeguard and control all that data in all those other, unknown, storage areas? This opens up the organization to many additional security, privacy, and legal risks."
8. Ali Golshan, CTO and Co-Founder of StackRox, on how data privacy can either put your organization at risk or be a marketing tool:
"Analytic infrastructures allow for powerful insights into data, but they create compliance and security risks for companies because data is often dumped into data lakes without proper labeling, auditing, or policy enforcement. We are seeing companies such as Apple building trust with customers by providing visibility and transparency into how that data is used."
9. U.S. Senator Ron Wyden, about his proposed bill to jail CEOs, CISOs, and Chief Privacy Officers who fail at privacy and cybersecurity. The bill's opening statement:
"The explosive growth in the collection and sale of consumer information enabled by new technology poses unprecedented risks for Americans’ privacy. The government has failed to respond to these new threats."
10. On the end of privacy as we know it, Joseph Carson, Chief Security Scientist at Thycotic, says:
"The end of privacy as we know it is closer than you may think. Privacy definitions are very different between nation states and cultures, however, one thing that is common is that privacy is becoming less and less of an option for most citizens. In public, almost everyone is being watched and monitored 24/7 with thousands of cameras using your expressions, fashion, walk, directions, interactions, and speech to determine what you need, what you might be thinking, who you are going to meet, who is nearby, and even algorithms that determine what your next action might be."
Walt Disney Company's 2019 privacy and security debate
And when it comes to privacy and security metrics organizations tie to senior executive compensation plans, who holds the risk and where do you draw the line?
Some Disney shareholders are proposing Disney look at increasing security and privacy metrics its executives must uphold in the future, but Disney's Board of Directors is encouraging them to vote against the 2019 stockholder measure:
"The board recommends you vote against this proposal. It is unnecessary and would not promote enhanced protection of data security and data privacy."
Judging from the comments on the Disney story, not everyone seems to agree.
