Why is investing in data protection important?
The confidence of users plays a vital role to the success of online platforms. there has been several data scandals during the past five years that severely damaged the confidence on online platforms. The introduction of many privacy regulations came in alignment with these privacy issues. One of the major aims of those regulations is to regain users’ confidence on online platforms. However, platforms needs to invest resources on data protection to comply with privacy regulations which will likely positively influence consumer trust.
The importance of investing in data protection is high because of its direct correlation with consumers trust. We will explore reasons why investing in data protection is important with Suneel Jethani, a data expert who is working with the Victorian Government as an engagement manager.
Omar 0:00: Welcome to the podcast for today’s topic, where you can learn more about the importance of investing in data protection. On October 31, 2019. We are going to interview an expert. Suneel Jethani, the engagement manager who is working in an open data program at the Department of premier and Cabinet of the Victorian Government. Thank you so much for being with us. We are really excited to know more about today’s topic.
Suneel 0:29: Thanks Omar
Omar 0:30: Alright, let’s get started. Now, many governments including Australia started to consider implementing online privacy standards. What are the disadvantages of not having such standards?
Suneel 0:45: Thanks so much. So, I think there’s probably two disadvantages of private sector organizations not having robust standards and the first of those would be reputational damage. to an organization. So, once there’s been a breach in privacy or there’s been malpractice around the way consumer data is handled, that obviously leads to a fair degree of reputational damage for that organization, which has flow on effects in terms of the viability of that organization in the competitive marketplace. The other disadvantage is a more serious one, and that is one of litigation. And organizations, if they are non-compliant, can find themselves in court. So in the last couple of days, we’ve seen Google be sued by the Australian Consumer Competition Commission for mishandling consumer data, or at least making it very difficult for consumers to make informed choice.
Omar 1:49: That’s true. That’s why giving control over to consumers is often discussed by the new privacy regulations. Let’s go straight to the second question. How Can these standards be beneficial to online platforms?
Suneel 2:04: I think that the real benefit of having published robust and transparent standards around the way organizations in the private sector handle consumer data is that it’s just simply a matter of corporate social responsibility and good governance on the part of organizations. So, I think that in that regard, more transparent standards around what organizations do with consumer data in terms of how they might be repurposing that and using that on how they might be aggregating that data up, and then on selling it to third party data vendors. So I think if there’s if there’s robust transparency around that and enough flexibility in the terms and conditions to which people sign up and sign over their data to accommodate the range of personal tolerances that consumers might have around what happens with their data once it’s within the kind of platform environment. I That that’ll be a, you know, a game changing move for organizations in terms of the kind of claims that can make around their corporate social responsibility practices when it comes to consumer information.
Omar 3:12: That’s actually sounds promising. But what if a platform did not invest much on data protection?
Suneel 3:19: So, I think that goes back to the two disadvantage I was speaking about earlier, and that is, reputational damage and litigation. And I think what happens in in most cases is those two things don’t occur in isolation. They combine with one another, and they create really negative effects for a platform sometimes even potentially forcing a platform to change business practices or, you know, in a more intense environment, perhaps a loss of consumer confidence.
Omar 3:53: Thank you so much. That’s going to be the end of today’s podcast. We were talking about the importance of investing and data protection with Suneel Jethani, follow us on social media to know what our topic is going to be for the next podcast. Give us thump’s up on our Facebook Page and visit to get tuned about upcoming podcasts
**Credits for audio on podcast: Podcast by JD Sound. Used with permission. Source: https://audiojungle.net/item/podcast/20467420