Privacy & Information Security Law Blog

The UK Information Commissioner’s Office (“ICO”) recently published a questionnaire to gather feedback on how privacy seals might be used to improve data protection compliance and customer privacy awareness. The questionnaire is available online until November 30, 2012.

The questionnaire was developed because the proposed data protection law reform package addresses the use of privacy seals, certification mechanisms and trust marks “allowing data subjects to quickly assess the level of data protection provided by controllers and processors.”

The purpose of the questionnaire is to provide the ICO with stakeholders’ views to inform the ICO’s future work in this area. As indicated on the ICO’s website, the ICO is particularly interested in:

1. Learning the best way of implementing privacy seal schemes in the UK;
2. Gauging organizations’ appetite for signing up to such schemes and hearing from companies who are operating, or thinking of operating such schemes;
3. Hearing about organizations’ practical experiences in operating or signing up to such schemes and what the commercial benefits are; and
4. Understanding organizations’ reservations about signing up to such a scheme.