Apple-Google Exposure Notification Proposal Not A Privacy Threat, Say Advocates - Forbes

Sue Friedberg, co-chair of Buchanan's Cybersecurity & Data Privacy group, was quoted in a Forbes article, "Apple-Google Exposure Notification Proposal Not A Privacy Threat, Say Advocates" on privacy concerns regarding COVID-19 tracking systems.

Sue Friedberg, an attorney with Pittsburgh-based Buchanan Ingersoll & Rooney who specializes in security and privacy said that her biggest concern is that privacy is maintained. “Anything that involves anonymizing data is potentially a huge problem for whoever is doing that because it’s very difficult to strip out personal identification from data.”

The problem, Friedberg said is that companies such as Google have so much information that it’s possible to reconstruct someone’s identity from what appears to be anonymous data. But she also said that the approach appears to be in line with the requirements of the CCPA and the GDPR, and she mentioned that the GDPR includes an exception that would cover privacy as it concerns public health.

“If done properly, it should be OK,” Friedberg said. “I think they will be closely scrutinized.”