By Alfredo Diez teacher "The risk in personal data processings” in the master's degree in Compliance & Data Protection Directorate of the EIP International Business School wanted to share with us a
Data Protection and Covid-19
Covid-19 or Coronavirus has come to change our world, we still do not know if forever, and data protection or Right to privacy It was not going to be an exception.
If in advanced societies, at least in European ones, it seemed clear that data protection had become an indispensable right that was constantly growing, this pandemic has made struggle between privacy and security come back to the fore. It is not new. Already after the 9/11 attacks we experienced a similar situation in which some of the demands of the right to privacy were certainly limited in pursuit of citizen security. In this case the security to protect is biological, our health.
In this scenario we must first ask ourselves if The pandemic eliminates our right to demand respect for our privacy, and the answer must be emphatically: NO. Now, if it is true that temporarily there will be a series of special circumstances.
In this regard, it is worth stopping at some of them:
- Companies and organizations will be able to take the temperature of their workers or users, and even in some cases carry out another series of medical examinations.
- Workers and users will be required to declare a positive or COVID-related symptoms.
- Companies and organizations will be authorized to process this health data of their employees and/or users.
- Companies and organizations will be able to establish contact tracing systems using technologies such as bluetooth either Wifi that allow the person's contacts to be established in the event of a possible positive, only while these people are in their facilities.
To establish this series of controls, three unavoidable requirements must be met:
- The user must be informed of what controls are carried out and how that information is used.
- The data will always be processed by Occupational Risk Prevention departments or duly accredited personnel.
- The data will be treated in an anonymized and confidential manner.
To close this analysis, it is worth mentioning that all these specialties will decline as soon as the pandemic situation does so, and that any subsequent use of them must be studied and adapted to current legislation.
Do you want to specialize in Compliance Management and data protection?
He Master in Compliance & Data Protection Management will make you a highly qualified professional with the necessary skills to carry out specialized tasks in two of the most relevant areas for both private businesses as for public administrations: data protection and regulatory compliance or Compliance.
