Public Policy

Report: From the Filing Cabinet to the Cloud: Updating the Privacy Act of 1974

This comprehensive report and proposed bill text is focused on the Privacy Act of 1974, an important and early Federal privacy law that applies to the government sector and some contractors. The Privacy Act was written for the 1970s information era — an era that was characterized by the use of mainframe computers and filing cabinets. Today’s digital information era looks much different than the ’70s: smart phones are smarter than the old mainframes, and documents are now routinely digitized and stored and perhaps even analyzed in the cloud, among many other changes. The report focuses on why the Privacy Act needs an update that will bring it into this century, and how that could look and work. This work was written by Robert Gellman, and informed by a two-year multi-stakeholder process.

WPF comments on European Commission proposal for new Health Authority

The European Commission has proposed the creation of a new European Health Emergency Preparedness and Response Authority, HERA. WPF provided comments regarding the proposal, urging the Commission to ensure from the outset that HERA will fulfill its mission with a focus on data interoperability and will include specific data governance and protection measures that will analyze

NIST report documents undeniable demographic effects in face recognition systems

WPF Press Release: NIST has issued extensive scientific documentation of demographic effects in face recognition systems in its new report, Face Recognition Vendor Test Part 3: Demographic Effects. The detailed findings in the NIST report are troubling. World Privacy Forum calls on the face recognition industry to accept, acknowledge, and address the new NIST findings, and calls for new multistakeholder work as well as significant safety guardrails.

WPF calls on Secretary of Homeland Security to provide formal notice and comment and address substantive concerns regarding the CBP biometric entry and exit program

The World Privacy Forum sent a detailed letter (PDF, 18 pages) September 18, 2018 to the Secretary of Homeland security outlining our substantive concerns regarding the US Department of Homeland Security (DHS) Customs and Border Protection (CBP) and Transportation Security Administration (TSA) biometric[1]entry and exit program. The World Privacy Forum[2]letter calls on the Secretary to provide formal