The Canadian Information Processing Society (CIPS) honoured Dr. Ann Cavoukian with its “CIPS Fellow” distinction last week.
The presentation was made by women representatives the of CIPS the Youth Council and its Sheridan College chapter, as well as student leaders from Conestoga College. The event included a presentation by the former privacy commissioner on her “Privacy by Design” framework, which seeks to proactively embed privacy into the design specifications of information technologies, networked infrastructure and business practices. Her work has been made part of the pending General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) is being implemented by the European Union, which will come into effect in May 2018 and affect organizations worldwide, including Canadian businesses.
Dr. Cavoukian is presently the Distinguished Expert-in-Residence at Ryerson University, where she leads the Privacy by Design Centre of Excellence. Appointed as the Information and Privacy Commissioner of Ontario in 1997, Dr. Cavoukian served an unprecedented three terms. During her tenure, regulators at the International Conference of Data Protection Authorities and Privacy Commissioners unanimously passed a resolution recognizing Privacy by Design as an essential component of fundamental privacy protection.
She is also the author of two books, “The Privacy Payoff: How Successful Businesses Build Customer Trust” with Tyler Hamilton and “Who Knows: Safeguarding Your Privacy in a Networked World” with Don Tapscott. Dr. Cavoukian was awarded the Meritorious Service Medal for her outstanding work on creating Privacy by Design and taking it global this past May.