Privacy/Privacy protection principles

Abstract

This document offers principle and guidance for privacy protection in the web environment. It aims to make designers, implementers, and those who deploy W3C specifications aware of privacy protection principles and help them put these principles into practice effectively.

Privacy protection principles

Clear purpose principle

The purpose of collecting and processing private information should be clear, specific and reasonable.

Agreement principle

The purpose, method and scope of collecting and processing private information should be noticed and agreed by the information owner beforehand.

Minimum usage principle

Only the minimum information should be collected and processed to achieve the usage purpose. After the usage purpose is achieved, private information should be deleted as soon as possible. The usage scope should be limited and the purpose should not be changed without noticing the information owner. [I think this sentence belongs under usage: --Charles McCathie Nevile (talk) 17:36, 15 September 2016 (UTC)]

Question: What if the purpose is to collect, and hold long-term, information about the user?

Question: What if the purpose is to monetise information about the user in order to fund a service?

Clear communication principle

The information owner should be told, in clear and easy to understand language.

• What information will be collected, and how.
• How it will be used, when it will be combined with other information or shared with others, and when it will be deleted

Quality guarantee principle

During the collecting and processing of privacy-sensitive information, the quality should be guaranteed to assure integrity, usability and timeliness.

Security assurance principle

Management measures and technical methods adapted to the security risks should be adopted to protect private information. Private information should be protected against unauthorized disclosure.

Individual participation principle

Simple and convenient mechanisms should be provided to the information owner to query, update and delete his/her private information.

Clear responsibility principle

The responsibility should be made clear during the collecting and processing private information. And corresponding measures should be taken for the responsibilities.

Disclosure limitation principle

When the information is disclosed, the agreement from information owner should be obtained, or the information should be anonymized.

Author

Edited by Kepeng Li, kepeng.lkp@alibaba-inc.com some comments and edits by Chaals McCathie Nevile, Yandex