The Federal Trade Commission (FTC) has become the leading federal agency to regulate privacy and data security. The scope of its power is vast – it covers the majority of commercial activity – and it has been enforcing these issues for decades. An FTC civil investigative demand (CID) will send shivers down the spine of […]
I created a new poster about information security training, which is debuting at the RSA conference. This poster is based on the fact that the vast majority of information security incidents and data breaches occur because of human mistakes. Information security is only in small part a technology problem; it is largely a human problem. […]
I’m pleased to announce a new training program: Spot the Risks: Privacy and Security. The program is a Where’s Waldo style risk-spotting game that takes about 5 minutes to complete. Trainees are asked to spot the risks in an office. Feedback is provided about each risk so trainees learn many of the most important best […]
By Daniel J. Solove Proponents for allowing government officials to have backdoors to encrypted communications need to read Franz Kafka. Nearly a century ago, Kafka deftly captured the irony at the heart of their argument in his short story, “The Burrow.” After the Paris attacks, national security proponents in the US and abroad have been […]
“The US is developing a law of cybersecurity that is incoherent and unduly complex,” says Ed McNicholas, one of the foremost experts on cybersecurity law. McNicholas is a partner at Sidley Austin LLP and co-editor of the newly-published treatise, Cybersecurity: A Practical Guide to the Law of Cyber Risk (with co-editor Vivek K. Mohan). The […]
By Daniel J. Solove The US regulates privacy with a sectoral approach, with laws that are directed only to specific industries. In contrast, the EU and many other countries have an omnibus approach — one overarching law that regulates privacy consistently across all industries. The US is an outlier from the way most countries regulate […]
I am pleased to announce that Alan Westin’s classic work, Privacy and Freedom, is now back in print. Originally published in 1967, Privacy and Freedom had an enormous influence in shaping the discourse on privacy in the 1970s and beyond, when the Fair Information Practice Principles (FIPPs) were developed. The book contains a short introduction […]
By Daniel J. Solove In a profound ruling with enormous implications,the European Court of Justice (ECJ) has declared the Safe Harbor Arrangement to be invalid. [Press Release] [Opinion] The Safe Harbor Arrangement The Safe Harbor Arrangement has been in place since 2000, and it is a central means by which data about EU citizens can […]
By Daniel Solove I previously shared 5 of my favorite novels about privacy and security, and I’d now like to share 6 of my favorite films about these topics — because I just couldn’t whittle the list down to 5. I was thinking about my favorite films because I’ve been putting together a session at […]
By Daniel J. Solove The recent breach of the Office of Personnel Management (OPM) network involved personal data on millions of federal employees, including data related to background checks. OPM is now offering 18 months of free credit monitoring and identity theft insurance to victims. But as experts note in a recent Washington Post article, […]