A new research laboratory focused on exploring and developing methods for businesses to protect customer information online will host an event today on the Tempe campus where the research lab will announce more details about its work.
The Privacy by Design Research Lab, a part of the W. P. Carey School of Business, will bring together representatives from organizations around the world to develop privacy standards for businesses to follow and perform research for how they can be implemented, said Julie Smith David, director of the Center for Advancing Business through Information Technology.
“Our research lab is being established to simultaneously perform research on business situations and identify what the best privacy practices are,” said Smith David, one of the research group’s founders.
Smith David said organizations are finding it’s in their best interest to be respectful and mindful of individuals’ private data from the start rather than wait until they encounter a privacy issue. Smith David said if a business messes up, its credibility could be gone.
“The idea is that companies will be much better off if they design their products and services with privacy as a key element,” she said.
One of the first issues the research lab will focus on is social networking business situations, Smith David said.
Social networking Web sites like Facebook store information uploaded by users on their computers and sometimes shares their information with third parties when users use applications, Smith David said.
“Everybody’s jumping into social networking, but nobody really knows what the ramifications could be,” she said. “Students are much more engaged in these online communities, much more engaged in sharing information, and yet we have to be really worried about how long will that information live, where will it get shared and how will that come back and affect you in the future. For people in my generation, I’m lucky that the mistakes I made in college are only in my friends’ minds.”
It’s important that ASU set the standards, Smith David said.
“We’re independent from any hardware or software vendor, and we can perform academic research to evaluate those guidelines,” she said.
Marilyn Prosch, a W.P. Carey School of Business associate professor and group founder, said online privacy has mostly been studied from a legal standpoint by lawyers and not from a business perspective.
“Businesses need to collect data for their business purposes, but also, do it in a respectful and privacy-thoughtful manner,” she said.
Prosch said the research lab will also get a government perspective at its event when Ann Cavoukian, information and privacy commissioner of Ontario, Canada, speaks.
Smith David said the Privacy by Design Research Lab will have monthly discussions with industry leaders on the fourth Tuesday of each month.
“We bring industry leaders to campus and try to tackle one element of their privacy strategy,” she said.
Reach the reporter at salvador.rodriguez@asu.edu.
