As technology has evolved, companies have realized that the data collection practices they deploy can often make the difference between success and failure. Depending on how this information is leveraged, the use of big data can push a company ahead of the competition through new data-driven strategies, uncovering numerous benefits. But the use of data also brings privacy questions and the challenge of complying with multiple regulations and business requirements.

Privacy professionals are struggling to reap to benefits of data while also keeping pace with the fluid regulatory landscape to protect their brand and reduce risk. Today, many global privacy laws require businesses to perform Privacy Impact Assessments (PIAs) to identify, assess and alleviate privacy risks associated with new products and business initiatives. PIAs can be extremely beneficial to an organization, yet many professionals don’t know where to start.  When do you conduct a PIA? How do you determine the scope or identify the best tools to streamline the process?

On October 21^st at 9am PT/12pm ET, join TRUSTe’s Ray Everett, Tony Berman and Return Path’s Dennis Dayman in the webinar titled Tips and Tools for Conducting Effective PIAs in Today’s Complex Privacy Landscape to learn how to efficiently plan and manage PIAs to ensure compliance and protect your brand:

• Understand how to mitigate compliance risks using PIAs
• Hear tips on how and when to use PIAs
• Gain insight from privacy experts with experience of using PIAs within their organizations
• See a demo of the new automated Assessment Manager module, part of TRUSTe’s Data Privacy Management (DPM) Platform

Don’t miss out – register for this webinar today!

Speaking at the Compliance Week Europe Conference in Brussels yesterday Sophie Narbonne, Deputy Director of Legal Affairs at the CNIL was one of the first to comment publicly following the recent European Cookie Sweep. Clarifying that they are still working on the results she said “It is clear that there is now a first layer of information (on websites) but the next stage is not clear enough and doesn’t give the right information for people to refuse cookies.” Following the coordinated inspections by European Data Protection Authorities last month, this is an interesting indication of what the CNIL, and wider European response will be to the findings.

Cookies were not the only hot topic of conversation as Sophie Narbonne addressed a packed house of Compliance Officers. As well as dealing with the inevitable questions about the Right to Be Forgotten, and progress with the EU Data Protection Regulation she used her keynote presentation to focus on two data protection concepts: accountability and interoperability.

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• October 13-14

Compliance Week Europe

Brussels, Belgium

Kevin Trilli, VP Product, TRUSTe will lead a workshop which looks at how compliance and privacy functions should be structured and work together and how global companies can navigate different privacy expectations between Europe and the United States. The session will include a demonstration of the TRUSTe DPM Platform to streamline enterprise data privacy management.

Register here for this event.

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By Alexandra Ross, The Privacy Guru (@sharemindfully)

Guest Blog

Whenever a new position emerges at the C-suite level, you can be certain substantial debate about exactly what the role encompasses and which skills are crucial for meeting an organization’s needs will follow. It’s understandable, as a new executive role is often a response to massive new complexities. Just consider how the computing revolution and the knowledge economy gave rise to CTO and CIO roles.

Today, extensions of those sea changes have placed new demands on companies – startups as well as more developed businesses. Mobile tech innovation, e-commerce, and the rapid growth of a globally networked society have elevated privacy into a priority issue. Make a list of high-profile stories over the past year, and you’ll be hard pressed to find one which doesn’t touch on data privacy: Revelations about government surveillance, app developers and social media companies experimenting with feed algorithms and location tracking, major retail security breaches… they all point towards increasing concern over privacy and the way institutions are not always fully prepared for the challenges privacy issues present.

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TRUSTe today announced that privacy specialist Josh Harris has joined the team as the new Director of Policy. Josh has an extensive background in the privacy field with experience as a former Department of Commerce staffer and Future of Privacy Forum Policy Director.

Josh will be responsible for driving programs that protect consumer privacy and ensure ethical and responsible data collection practices worldwide. Josh is a known expert and thought leader in the Asia Pacific Economic Cooperation’s (APEC) Cross Border Privacy Rules (CBPR) System, a program which ensures safe data transfer that is compliant with global privacy frameworks.

Josh’s insights will be extremely beneficial in expanding the CBPR system and ensuring that we remain at the cutting edge of regulatory and technology developments on behalf of our global client-base. We’re thrilled to have Josh onboard!

For more on this announcement, read the press release and for more information on TRUSTe’s APEC certification program, visit www.truste.com/apec.

With the explosion of big data, companies know that successful data collection is crucial to the success of their business.  If collected and analyzed properly, the use of big data can help companies outperform the competition by leveraging new data-driven strategies, uncovering new trends and benefits. However, the use of this data also brings significant privacy challenges relating to consumer trust and regulatory compliance.

In today’s evolving privacy landscape, privacy professionals have struggled to keep pace with changing technology, legal and compliance risk requirements in order to protect their brand. These professionals are tasked with the difficult challenge of staying on top of numerous privacy laws and regulations in multiple locations (such as APEC, COPPA, and the EU Cookie Directive) while at the same time, enabling the proper controls and ongoing monitoring procedures across privacy, IT, legal and business units within the company.

Today, TRUSTe has launched the Data Privacy Management (DPM) Platform, the industry’s first end-to-end data privacy management solution to help enterprises manage complex privacy initiatives. This platform makes it simpler for privacy professionals to manage all their needs in once place by allowing them to assess and manage global privacy risks, implement compliance controls and ensure ongoing monitoring across multiple business teams using a single dashboard.

Key features of the TRUSTe DPM Platform:

• Integrated Data and Process Audits
• Assessment Template Library
• Compliance Reviews
• Privacy Controls Database
• Automated Gap Analysis
• Compliance Reporting
• Streamlined Workflow Management
• Centralized Project Archive
• Enterprise Privacy Dashboard

What’s more, Forrester recently released a TEI study citing 151% ROI for enterprises using TRUSTe – proving the benefits of privacy investment.

For more information on the platform, read the press release or contact TRUSTe sales at 1-888-878-7830 (U.S) or +44 (0) 203 078 6495 (EMEA).

As Apple released the latest update to their privacy policy today, it included the new TRUSTe APEC Privacy Seal certifying that Apple abides by the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) Cross Border Privacy Rules System. Apple joins Box as the latest in a growing list of companies who are choosing APEC Certification to demonstrate their commitment to consumer privacy and ensure they transfer data around the world in a safe way in compliance with global privacy frameworks.

The APEC CBPR System is a self-regulatory initiative that addresses cross border data flows between the United States and other APEC Member Economies through voluntary and enforceable codes of conduct adopted by participating businesses. TRUSTe was approved as the first Accountability Agent for the APEC CBPR System in June 2013.

Currently three APEC Member Economies participate in the CBPR system, the United States, Mexico and Japan, with Canada having formally submitted its notice of intent to participate in the system. As an Accountability Agent, TRUSTe reviews, certifies, monitors and enforces the privacy practices of participating U.S.-based companies or subsidiaries to ensure compliance with the CBPR system.

Congratulations to Apple and Box on their APEC Certification. Find out more about the TRUSTe APEC Privacy program here: www.truste.com/apec.