How the healthcare industry can improve online trust

Privacy on the internet is important in all industries, but none more so than the healthcare sector, which handles mass amounts of online health data daily. While any data loss (financial, identification, passwords, etc.) is significant, it can be particularly wrenching to think of one’s personal medical details floating in the cloud, accessible to anyone…

GDPR Drives Changes, but Privacy by Design Proves Elusive

In the year since it went into effect, the European Union’s General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) has heightened awareness of data privacy issues and driven some important changes in how US companies handle consumer data. However, most organizations appear to be a long way off from implementing GDPR’s core requirement for a privacy-by-design model for…

How much does the average employee know about data privacy?

With the impacts and repercussions of the looming California Consumer Privacy Act (CCPA) on the minds of many privacy professionals, new research from MediaPRO shows more work is needed to train U.S. employees of this first-of-its-kind privacy regulation. MediaPRO’s 2019 Eye on Privacy Report reveals 46 percent of U.S. employees have never heard of CCPA,…

Consumers have few legal options for protecting privacy

There are no promises in the words, “We care about user privacy.” Yet, these words appear on privacy policy after privacy policy, serving as disingenuous banners to hide potentially invasive corporate practices, including clandestine data collection, sharing, and selling. This is no accident. It is a strategy. In the US, companies that break their own…

Facebook Faces Criminal Probe of Data Deals: Report

A grand jury in New York has subpoenaed information from at least two major smartphone makers about such arrangements with Facebook, according to the Times. Regulators, investigators and elected officials around the world have already been digging into the data sharing practices of Facebook which has more than two billion users. The social network’s handling…

Consumers Care About Security – Sometimes

Consumer concern about cybersecurity and privacy is very real but not evenly distributed, a new report shows: while passwords and financial information are worrying for everyone, concern about other information varies widely depending on the individual’s age, gender, and national origin. The RSA Data Privacy & Security Survey 2019 of more than 6,000 adults contains…

What steps consumers need to take to protect themselves online

Yesterday was Data Privacy Day, so McAfee warned consumers that cybercriminals are continuing to access personal information through weak passwords, phishing emails, connected things, malicious apps and unsecure Wi-Fi networks. Weak Passwords Consumers often pick simple passwords for the multiple accounts they use daily, not realizing that choosing weak passwords can open the door to…