At a time when risks to data protection and privacy seem to be ever-increasing, Bailiwick Data Protection Commissioner Brent Homan shares a message of hope for a future where our rights are courageously defended and advanced.
As humans, we tend to suffer from negativity bias leading us to dwell more on negative than positive events and experiences. That may be the reason why every day, for the last 30 years, an average of 137,000 people have escaped extreme poverty with little notice. That’s over a billion people folks, with nary a headline. We are also living in a digital era where dialogue and debate is often marked by outrage, self-righteous posturing and condescension.
Never have sides been so polarized along socio-political lines, yet so similar in how they indignantly ‘engage’ with each other.
This all gives us good reason to pause during the holiday season and embrace the promise of kindness and the hope for brighter futures. It is a hope that surrounds us, even in the challenging world of data-protection where perils abound.
In celebrating this hope let’s journey first to Guernsey’s classrooms, where the future leaders of the world are being nurtured and inspired. It is from one of these classrooms, that we received the warmest of messages from a parent regarding a “gentleman” from our office that lit a fire of wonder in a young child’s imagination over a reading of “Warro” going on a data protection adventure. That ‘gentleman’ was Tom Elliott, an investigator turned ‘classroom bard’, who alongside his colleagues has been spreading the word of data protection throughout the Bailiwick’s schools this past term. Life as a regulator can prove pretty rough stuff, but nothing replenishes our hearts or emboldens us with faith in a promise-filled future than to learn that we have made a difference in a young child’s life.
Next stop on our journey of hope - the east coast of Africa where the promotion of privacy rights continues its progressive expansion in the developing world. Just last month in Jersey the Global Privacy Assembly welcomed the Somalia Data Protection Authority as an official member. In its short history the Authority has bounded onto the Data Protection scene determined to bring the benefits of privacy rights to Somalia's citizens.
Driven by the efforts of our very own Lawrence West, our office was not only honoured to help Somalia attend the session, but I personally had the privilege of standing alongside Najmo Fiyasko who represented Somalia in a discussion where we shared strategies for how best to protect citizens rights in a global landscape fraught with threats. In addition to her day job at the Somalia authority, Najmo is a renowned international leader and champion for women's rights in developing nations.
In celebrating leading women in data protection, our journey of hope brings us back home to the Channel Islands, where we are truly blessed with an embarrassment of riches. Founder of the Islands Data Governance forum, Steph Luce has made it her mission to bring the advantages of data protection to industry and develop strategies to ward off unrelenting cyber-attacks on the islands. Oxford scholar and Guernsey’s very own Dr. Victoria Nash, stands as a beacon for children’s rights, calling on us to ensure that we pause and listen to their voices as we shape a digital future that both empowers and protects them. Guernsey Deputy Data Commissioner Rachel Masterton has rapidly emerged as a global leader in enforcement cooperation, assuming the role as co-chair of the ternational Enforcement Working Group that has inspired joint action against global privacy threats including data-scraping. And finally, we would simply not have a progressive data protection law or enjoy the status of European adequacy in the Bailiwick, without the courageous leadership of the States of Guernsey’s head of Data Protection, Callie Loveridge.
Wow, that’s a proper measure of ‘ hope’ isn’t it?!
You see, the easiest trap to fall into is to see the darkness of humanity everywhere and lay criticism at its feet. The challenge is to muster the courage to take what is imperfect and make it better. It is in that collective mission that we drive ourselves forward with intent and purpose to build a brighter world for ourselves and our children. And it is in that mission that hope, faith, and dare I say "love" resides.
With that, on behalf of myself and my friends at the Data Protection Office - I wish you and your families all the best during this holiday season.
Brent
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Indulge