Today is International Data Privacy Day!

Today is International Data Privacy Day, a holiday seeking to raise awareness and promote data privacy education. It is coordinated by The Privacy Projects, a non-profit organization founded in 2008 for investigating and recommending enhancements to current privacy polices, practices, and technologies.

In today's fast-paced, networked world, our identities, locations, contacts, purchases, histories, etc. are documented in various bytes and bits. Data Privacy Day asks that we stop and question how information is being collected, who is collecting it, and what they're doing with it. It also aims to raise awareness in people who may not be particularly web-savvy or knowledgeable about how to protect themselves and how their information is being used.

On January 26, 2009 the United State House of Representatives declared January 28 2009 Data Privacy Day. The U.S. Senate passed a resolution two days later, marking the first data privacy celebration. The day is currently celebrated in the United States, Canada, and 27 European counties.

The Privacy Projects says that data privacy is not only for individuals, but that businesses need to understand the importance of their compliance with privacy laws and regulations. The group stresses that business operators must understand that consumers need/want to trust their products or services before they're willing to pay for them; it is up to the consumers to enforce this attitude. This link contains a list of organizations participating in Data Privacy Day 2010.

Personally, I hadn't heard of this event until I was perusing Engineering News this morning, but it's good to be aware of. Had anyone else heard of this day, or any organization doing anything for it?

For more information on Data Privacy Day, please see the following links:

http://dataprivacyday2010.org/

http://theprivacyprojects.org/

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Data_Privacy_Day