On August 25, 2020, Hunton’s Centre for Information Policy Leadership (“CIPL”) released a new paper entitled “Data Protection in the New Decade: Lessons from COVID-19 for a US Privacy Framework.” The paper examines how the COVID-19 pandemic has emphasized the need for a U.S. federal privacy law.
It also highlights seven key takeaways from the pandemic to consider when developing this new law:
- Data and the technologies that facilitate its collection and use are an essential part of our lives.
- A federal privacy law must not impede the responsible use of artificial intelligence technology.
- The right to privacy must be balanced with other fundamental rights.
- Traditional interpretations of data protection principles have proven insufficient to keep up with modern data uses.
- Privacy laws should focus less on the collection of data and more on the use of data after collection.
- Privacy laws should embrace an accountability and risk-based model of data protection.
- Comprehensive federal privacy legislation, as opposed to state-by-state regulation, is the best approach to ensuring privacy protections in the United States.
CIPL also has posted a summary of the paper on its blog, A Very CIPL Solution.