Carnegie Mellon University
November 03, 2017

Sadeh Tapped to Give Keynote at Trans-Atlantic Privacy Initiative Workshop

By Josh Quicksall

Professor Norman Sadeh, faculty member in the School of Computer Science’s Institute for Software Research,  will be delivering the  keynote on November 10 at a joint EU-US workshop, “Privacy Engineering Research and the GDPR: A Trans-Atlantic Initiative”.

Co-organized with the EU Data Protection Supervisor, the workshop will bring together European and American privacy engineering experts to explore the challenges presented by the European Union’s forthcoming General Data Protection Regulation - challenges which will also impact US technology companies operating in Europe.

These challenges, Sadeh notes, are significant from a privacy engineering perspective. Issues such as the right for your data to be erased or your right to take your data collected by one provider and transfer it to another are at the forefront of many corporate IT agendas. “Furthermore, there are also a number of issues that remain unresolved,” Sadeh explains, “in particular issues related to transparency and consent, including how to treat data inferred by data mining processes.”

In addition to his significant contributions to the field of privacy research, Sadeh is also the co-founder and Co-Director of the Master of Science in Information Technology—Privacy Engineering (MSIT-PE) degree program. Founded by Sadeh and ISR colleague, Lorrie Cranor, the one-of-a-kind graduate program aims to train technologists to understand and apply privacy principles from day-one in the design of products and services.

Over the past fifteen years, CMU’s research and education programs in privacy have contributed to shaping policy discussions in the US and other parts of the world and have also had a significant influence on developments in industry. “The fact that CMU is a co-organizer of the event and that I was invited to give the opening keynote, right after the EU Data Protection Supervisor” Sadeh explains, “is a testament to the thought leadership offered by our program and the high esteem in which our research group is held.”