Shift Left Privacy

We have already seen ‘Shift Left Security‘ in another post…now, it is time to discuss ‘Shift Left Privacy’ in this post…

Privacy principles don’t stand on its own….Rather it stands along with legal, risk and compliance principles. We are slowly moving to an era of preventive privacy where we try to incorporate privacy principles much earlier in the project. Hence comes the concept of ‘Shift Left Privacy’,

What is Shift Left Privacy?

‘Shift Left Privacy’ is shifting Privacy much earlier in the SDLC rather than later in the project. This means applying privacy controls and practices much earlier such that the project is more effective, robust and more secure. As with Shift Left Security, collaboration between different teams and working with deep trust and mutual respect for each other will go a long way in making sure that systems will be safe and secure in a Shift Left Privacy environment.

How do we Shift Privacy Left?

1. We can Shift Privacy Left by implementing Data Protection by Design principles as early as possible. Data Protection by Design involves the practice of adopting pseudonymisation techniques(replacing original information with other information such that the original person cannot be identified) and employing encoding much earlier in the lifecycle.
2. Making sure that data minimization principles are upheld and minimal personal data is collected from the beginning
3. Privacy policies if drafted can be applied very early on in the project lifecycle.
4. In the case of social media account creation, user accounts can be designed to be opened with minimal personal information

What are the advantages of shifting privacy left?

1. Possibility of lesser amount of personal information being leaked
2. Huge amount of cost savings when done much earlier rather than later
3. Regulatory alignment much early on
4. Comprehensive data protection is adopted much early and this will ensure data safety and security for all.

Have you heard of ‘Shift Privacy Left’ before? What do you think of it?

This post is for alphabet ‘S’ for BlogchatterA2Z 2024!