By: Lilian Owusu-Mensah
The Data Protection Officer from the Institute for Internet Professional Ghana(IIPGH), Emmanuel Gadasu, has said that data privacy is very key to the life of every individual.
As part of raising the awareness for Data Protection and Privacy Day, he indicated that it is very important for every individual to keep their information private.
“This is important because privacy is very key to our individual lives. The more people know about you the more control they exert over you, or they would have over you and it is likely they would abuse that information about you. So, it is important that you keep it private”, he stated.
Speaking on the GTV Breakfast Show, Mr. Gadasu explained data privacy, data protection, personal data and outlined some examples.
“Data privacy is where individuals protect themselves to restrict the amount of information about them that others need to have access to. Data protection is a whole process on its own whereby, right from the data life cycle, from the collection, its processing, storage, archiving and destruction, all the security and the safety measures you put in place so that along that chain, at every point in time it is regulated, protected and well secured. Personal data is any information about you that can be used to identify you as who you are. These include phone numbers, name, health insurance card number, passport number and all that, like the car you drive, your car number are linked to you. Your DNA, your fingerprints, your voiceprints…the post on your social media platforms because you said it and it can be linked to you”, he opined.
He said personal data is anything that can be used to trace someone.
“Anything emanating from you that can be traced back to you is personal data ”, he opined.
Data Privacy Day is an international event that occurs every year on 28th January 2022. The purpose of Data Privacy Day is to raise awareness and promote privacy and data protection best practices. It is currently observed in the United States, Canada, Nigeria, Israel and 47 European Countries.
