I’ve been squinting into the future –
and now I’m ready to face the forthcoming year with renewed vigour.
The
good news, in terms of data protection standards, is that not much is likely to
change in 2015. So we should carry on trying to apply the rules we already know
about. Officials from the EU member states will continue to meet to consider
how the current standards ought to be modified. They will be placed under
increasing pressure from politicians who are keen to be seen to be raising data
protection standards across the globe -
but whether citizens will actually feel better protected this time next year as
a result of all this pressure is highly unlikely.
Communications
Data
Petty
criminals will flourish as law enforcement investigators working with local
authorities (the sort that investigate dodgy dealers, con men, environmental
health breaches, trading standards officials – you know the sort) will be
starved of the resources that are required to obtain legal orders forcing
communication service providers to supply the evidence that is so useful in
securing convictions. Local politicians will increasing explain that they don’t
have the funds to pay for the data requests to be approved by local magistrates,
and as its only low level crime, the national media won’t bother drawing
attention to the problem.
Connected
Cars
Regulators
will realise, only far too late, that new EU rules on mandating electronic
communication devices in cars have placed users under a new level of
surveillance. Although primarily designed for use in locating a car after an
accident, its “always on” facility provides amazing opportunities for data
controllers that have other purposes in mind.
Cybersecurity
Consumers
will reduce their expectations about the extent to which their data is safe
when online. The media will continue to report on large-scale cyber security
incidents, increasingly committed by state actors for political and national
security reasons. Regulators will be increasingly drawn onto prolonged disputes
about the extent to which data controllers are reliable for security breaches
that result from attacks by professional criminals and (state-sponsored)
hackers.
Data
Retention
Data
retention requirements will feature in 2015 – but with a twist. This
time, regulators will press for data to be retained for longer periods, in
order that the actions of suspected offenders can be reviewed long after their
deeds were committed, while the more slippery data controllers will press for
data to be deleted ever faster, to prevent evidence about said organisations
being potentially available to prosecutors in the event that past behaviours
need to be reviewed.
Drones
Despite
continuing to drone on about drones, guidance about “safe droning”, issued in
the UK by the Surveillance Camera Commissioner, the Information Commissioner,
the Civil Aviation Authority and a myriad of other bodies will be blissfully
ignored by many thousands of happy droners, most of whom will be entirely
unaware of the laws they will continue to break.
Employment
Opportunities
HR
Departments will continue to see data protection as an issue that requires a
lawyer on board, rather than a hands-on data protection practitioner. The focus
will continue to be mainly on “what does the current law, or a possible new
law, mean for the organisation?” It ought to be “what do regulators expect an organisation to do to ensure that procedures
are in place that implement the current, and possibly any future requirements,
within the organisation?”
Fortress
EU
EU
citizens will continue to take advantage of innovative and compelling services
from data controllers whose vision and ambition outstrips those who advocate
the constraints of protectionism afforded by the administrators of a would-be
EU super state.
Privacy
People’s
expectations of what personal privacy means will continue to be shaped by the
extent to which they wish to engage online. Privacy will increasing become a
luxury, a privilege that will be paid for through the use of subscription-only
services. The overwhelming majority of citizens will be increasingly aware of
the value exchange that occurs when they consume “free stuff” – and they will remain
very happy to share “their” information for the “free” stuff.
Privacy
Advocates
Will
continue to flourish, but towards the margins of the debate. Colourful
individuals will be courted by the media, and good stories will emerge that
entertain and occasionally inform the public, whose insatiable thirst for news
will momentarily focus on the odd data incident. But public attention will soon
move on to other stories.
The
Surveillance Society
Despite
the cry of frustration from law enforcement officials whose job has been made
much harder by the wholly predictable (and necessary) need for communications
service providers to provide better layers of encryption and security, the
overwhelming majority of citizens will accept that public surveillance is a
necessary way of life in the democratic part of the developed world.
The
greater integrity that democratically elected politicians (and regulators)
have, the greater will be the public acceptance that surveillance will be used
for benign purposes. My crystal ball was, unfortunately, unable to tell me
whether the integrity of democratically elected politicians (or regulators) was
likely to climb or drop in 2015.
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