Posted: May 17, 2017 by

Last updated:

The Asia Pacific Privacy Authorities (APPA) began an initiative called Privacy Awareness Week, or PAW, with the purpose of educating users about current privacy issues and promoting the importance of keeping their personal information safe. This remains the core of why it exists for more than a decade now.

The Asia Pacific Privacy Authorities (APPA) began an initiative called Privacy Awareness Week, or PAW, with the purpose of educating users about current privacy issues and promoting the importance of keeping their personal information safe.

This remains the core of why it exists for more than a decade now.

For those who may not be familiar with what this campaign is all about, this post aims to answer the questions you may have in mind about PAW.

When is Privacy Awareness Week?

APPA typically celebrates Privacy Awareness Week in May every year. Since the organization has a number of member countries, they each decide on when they want to hold the event locally.

In the first week of May, Singapore held its PAW locally. Hong Kong, New Zealand, and the United States held their own campaigns in the second week of May.

Australia is celebrating Privacy Awareness Week this week.

Are there other countries that will hold this event?

There are a total of 11 member countries comprising APPA. Aside from those already mentioned, Canada, Colombia, Korea, Macao, Mexico, and Peru are or will also be celebrating this campaign.

What’s the theme of this year’s Privacy Awareness Week?

There are two themes that APPA members are using: “Share with care” and “Trust and transparency”.

Share with care. This stresses on the importance of caring for your privacy, given that our current technological landscape is heavily data-driven. It also reminds users to think about what may or may not happen to their personal information once they have been shared.

Trust and transparency: Both trust and transparency are vital to each another, as people normally expect one to exist with the other. Case in point, it is important for businesses to gain the trust of their clients and it’s important for clients to know that the businesses they trust are clear about what they do, how they store, and how they use what they give them, which in this case is their personal information.

Can we celebrate Privacy Awareness Week even if our country is not a member of APPA?

Privacy Awareness Week is about educating users concerning privacy. There are ways individuals and organizations can celebrate PAW. One example is to use social media to raise awareness to your followers. Another is to do a refresher of your organization’s privacy policy. If they don’t have one, why not encourage your organization to make one?

Privacy and security go hand in hand. Practicing solid cybersecurity hygiene coupled with a fair familiarity of how personal data changes hands can bring about positive experiences to our digital lives. As such, we encourage you, dear Reader, to check out some of our previous posts and reacquaint yourselves on how you can keep your data safe and your computing devices secure:

Happy Privacy Security Week, everyone, wherever you are, and remember to share your personal info with care!