What’s New This Week:
Some (Data) Privacy, Please!
Most of us received the “Presidential Alert” on our phones last week. FEMA wanted to test its new emergency messaging system, but instead ended up creating a lot of confusion and unease. The Integrated Public Alert Warning System, or IPAWS, is designed to inform the public about a major national emergency. Despite the alert’s puzzling name, it didn’t actually come from the president. Still, many are concerned about this type of system and see it as an invasion of personal privacy.
Not surprisingly, there’s already a lawsuit claiming the FEMA alert system is comparable to “hijacking private property for the purpose of planting a Government-controlled loudspeaker in the home and on the person of every American.” One wonders how the plaintiffs must feel about Alexa…
Privacy concerns will never go away as technology penetrates every aspect of our lives and the misuse of consumer data continues on social media. To address some of these issues, the Commerce Department has launched initiatives to create new consumer privacy guidelines for federal agencies and private companies. Agencies are increasingly collecting consumer data and public awareness of privacy issues is growing. The EU’s General Data Protection Regulation and California’s new privacy law are also adding to the pressure on the U.S. government.
BGOV’s Chris Cornillie explains the factors driving the Commerce Department’s efforts to overhaul privacy standards in this week’s exclusive story.
In related news, the tech industry is suddenly open to the idea of federal privacy legislation. Could it be post-Cambridge Analytica guilt? Not likely, according to one privacy advocate: Shockingly, it seems that tech companies may not have consumers’ best interests at heart when they embrace regulation. Involving the Trump administration and Congress in their efforts may, in fact, weaken state-level consumer privacy protections. What’s the old saying? Keep your friends close, and your regulators closer.
Finally, as you well know, the U.S. government collects and stores tons of consumer data, yet it has very few data leaders. Chief data officers exist at only six of the 24 departments and major agencies, according to an IBM Center report. At the bureau level, scientific and statistical agencies have CDOs, but most large federal agencies don’t have data leadership.
You can’t argue with that data! More news you can use:
