Data privacy protects personal information from misuse. It is about who collects your data, what they do with it, and who they share it with. Privacy laws give individuals rights over their data: the right to know, the right to delete, the right to opt out of sale. GDPR in Europe and CCPA in California are the most well-known. Other jurisdictions have followed with their own rules.

Privacy is not the same as security. Security protects data from attackers. Privacy protects people from legitimate organizations that collect too much. A company can have excellent security and still violate privacy by selling user data without consent. The reverse is also true. Privacy is a design choice. Collect only what you need. State clearly why you need it. Keep it only as long as necessary. Give users control. These principles are simple to state and hard to implement at scale. Data spreads across systems, backups, and third-party vendors. A deletion request must propagate everywhere. Most organizations are still catching up. The penalties are real. GDPR fines have reached hundreds of millions of euros. Regulators are not waiting for companies to figure it out.

Privacy principles

• Data minimization — collect only what is necessary
• Purpose limitation — use data only for stated purposes
• Storage limitation — delete data when no longer needed
• User rights — access, correction, deletion, portability
• Consent — clear, informed, and revocable

Privacy is about respect. The data belongs to the person it describes, not to the organization that collected it.