User data creates opportunities & risk

Organizations must deeply respect each step of their relationships with people — from casual website viewers to repeat customers. And in the age of GDPR, CCPA and the soon-to-be-implemented (in 2023) California Privacy Rights Act, organizations that have large amounts of user data can no longer ignore their legal responsibilities and new obligations to provide transparency into their own practices. 

You must not only *walk the walk* when it comes to being responsible with user data, but also be able to *prove it* by having effective systems for Right to Delete and Right to Know requirements. 

If your organization didn’t make significant changes after GDPR, or is still trying to navigate exactly how you’ll comply with any federal legislation in the U.S. that would be similar to GDPR, then you need to get serious about organization-wide data audits and data supply chain audits of any systems that partners have access to (particularly via Javascript piggybacking on webpages). 

Organizations can safely and effectively optimize business decisions and increase revenue from user data, but this process is usually broken in many places — with either technical failures or systems that leak user data in unexpected ways.

An organization should be able to navigate how to properly collect consent across the content, services and products that are being offered, while also being to optimize their own marketing and business decisions. And if you don’t know where your systems are currently broken or un-optimized, you’ve got some work to do…