COLUMNISTS – DATA PROTECTION
Don’t be seduced by an international data
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protection regime, say permission marketing experts
ROSEMARY SMITHand JENNY MOSELEY.
universe
for the direct
and interactive
marketing
industry
On the case
If you are a data protection commissioner, nirvana might be a
place where data protection rules are the same everywhere in
the world and the privacy of the individual is guaranteed, no
matter where they live. For embattled international direct
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marketers who struggle to understand local data protection laws
and their annoying variances, this view of the world could seem
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very seductive.
Imagine . . . no more worrying about whether the law of origin
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or law of destination applies; no more concerns about whether
the sign up has to include an opt-in or an opt-out; no need to wrap
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personal data in cast-iron contractual clauses just to get it from
A to B. Sounds great, doesn’t it?
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Unfortunately, the reality may be less palatable, producing
an unwelcome harmonisation of restrictions at the highest
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possible level.
One of the seven resolutions recently adopted at the
International Conference of Data Protection and Privacy
Commissioners (where 78 national data protection commissioners
came together in Strasbourg for a privacy ‘love-in’) expressed ‘the
urgent need for protecting privacy in a borderless world’ and
called on the International Law Commission of the United Nations
to continue its work towards a global regime.
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But how could this mythical regime create a balance between
what the commissioners themselves recognise as the significant
‘privacy disparities’ to be found around the world?
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High level of protection
Perhaps a hint of what might be ahead is that the first proposer of
this resolution is the Spanish Data Protection Commission –known
to be among the hawks when it comes to enforcement and
especially tough on exporting data. Reading on, marketers might
feel a frisson when they see the commissioners plan ‘to elaborate
a set of principles and rights which, while reflecting and
complementing existing texts, aim to achieve the maximum
degree of international acceptance ensuring a high level of
protection’. I think we all know what that means.
The borderless world of the Internet is clearly under the
spotlight: ‘Borderless . . . because the tools of the digital society
(search engines, social networks, RFIDs, geolocalisation,
biometrics, and so on) accompany everyone at each stage of life
by leaving permanently individual and borderless traces in both
space and time.’ It is perhaps no co-incidence that two of the
other resolutions attacked social networking and children’s
online privacy.
It is just possible that this privacy heaven might be a
marketers’ hell.
Rosemary Smith and Jenny Moseley are co-directors of Opt-4.
Visit their website: www.opt-4.co.uk
40 January/February 2009 www.dmi-news.com
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