Ubiquitous Computing at a Crossroads: Art, Science, Politics and Design 

January 6th and 7th 2009
Huxley Building, Imperial College London

Ubicomp challenges for data protection law

Ian Brown, Oxford Internet Institute

Presentation slides

Data protection law in Europe and elsewhere is based around principles first enumerated during the 1970s - that data about individuals should be processed fairly and lawfully; that the amount of data collected should be minimised given the task at hand; that users should be notified of processing, and explicitly consent to the processing of sensitive data (concerning their health, trade union membership, politics, sex life and several other categories).

Are these principles being made obselete by the development of new computing technology, particularly ubiquitous computing? Or are they generalisable enough to protect users' privacy in a world of ambient intelligence?