The Privacy Good Research Fund will soon be opening again and accepting applications. The Fund is intended for privacy-related research projects and awareness raising initiatives.

Many people in New Zealand - such as students and the elderly - use a concession that gives them a free or subsidised fare on public transport. In order to assess whether someone is eligible for these concession cards, the transport provider collects personal information. This information includes things like student ID cards, tertiary student ID cards or other photo ID. 

In 2015, we distributed our $70,000 Privacy Good Research Fund to four different projects, all of which focused on finding new evidence about an aspect of privacy. Last month, that fund came to fruition and we had our Privacy Research Symposium, a day where the recipients of the fund presented their findings.

Privacy scholars from the Asia Pacific region recently gathered to share research, ask difficult questions, push the boundaries of privacy concepts and grapple with the challenges of new technology. Several themes emerged including cultural concepts of privacy, the pervasive collection of personal information, challenges to rights of access to personal information and the impact of the new European General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR).

I was recently lucky enough to attend the Asian Privacy Scholars Network 5th International Conference, hosted by the Business School at the University of Auckland.

Personal health information in electronic health records is increasingly shared in many settings, across disciplines and health care organisations. In recognition of this, considerable work has been done at the highest professional levels around patient record access, data security and the privacy safeguards required of the new systems.

If you’re interested in privacy research, you might want to be in Auckland during the week of 12-16 December. So much is going on that the Privacy Commissioner has named it Privacy Research Week.

Mark your calendars as Auckland will host three international privacy events in December.