How to Build Privacy By Design into Web and Mobile

A session at SXSW Interactive 2012

Building great online and mobile products is hard enough with a small team and limited resources, so why add to the difficulty by embracing “privacy by design” principles? With so many free, easy web tools available and an “everyone else is doing it” mentality, why take time to create extra user controls and transparency? The reality is your users are starting to understand the issues and will soon demand it. You should demand it too. But most online tools compromise user privacy at some level, and almost none provide the new benefits that result when privacy is baked in from the start. So, what to do? You can build your own tools, requiring time, skill, patience, and functionality trade-offs; pay a third party for their tools; or adapt open source solutions. Or you can shrug your shoulders and roll the dice... In this session, learn how the CTO of Personal, a private personal network and data vault service, has built privacy into the company’s DNA and how you can too.

About the speaker

This person is speaking at this event.

Tarik Kurspahic

Chief Technology Officer, Personal

Tarik Kurspahic is co-founder and CTO at Personal, a private, personal network and data vault that allows individuals to organize, search and control access to their digital information and online identity. Tarik has architected and built platforms and websites for the last 15 years. He has lived and breathed computers since he fell in love with programming an Apple IIe to draw with Logo in the mid-80s. He is in charge of Personal's platform architecture, security and operations. Prior to Personal, Tarik was CTO of The Map Network, where he built mapping and content platforms in data-driven location services & advertising that served clients such as the NFL Super Bowl, NBA, The Smithsonian, 100+ city governments/tourism bureaus, and thousands of events, venues and local merchants. The acquisition of The Map Network, first by NAVTEQ and then by NOKIA, gave Tarik the opportunity to architect solutions affecting millions of people. He graduated magna cum laude from Salem State College with a BS in Computer Science. When he's not behind his keyboard, you may find him on a soccer field, playing music, or at the picture-taking end of a camera.