Research and Education Initiatives
IAF Research and Educational Initiatives
Central to our mission is conducting research that advances accountability and trustworthy information policy that encourages all the benefits of the digital age while mitigating risks, allowing data to serve people and society.
The IAF provides education to regulatory, policymaker, business and other stakeholders on how accountability may be applied to meet the demands of new innovations and business models.
Research Initiatives –
The IAF concentrates its research in these primary focus areas:
As the new wave of artificial intelligence integrates the digital, physical, and biological spheres together, this will make tremendous impact in data-driven research, including health and medical device research. Public policy, proposed laws and regulatory approaches articulate more explicit and demonstrable accountability processes for artificial intelligence (AI). There is no common standard as to what these new demonstrable processes should consist of. This void includes how DPA’s and other assessment requirements should be structured. This lack of common expectations regarding standards of practice creates uncertainty for businesses wishing to grow their use of data. For research to benefit patient and societal interests, trust-enhancing frameworks should be developed for a purely digital research environment.
The IAF has drafted model fair processing legislation to inform legislative processes in the United States and other jurisdictions intent on drafting legislation in response to risks to people from the accelerated use of observational data, advanced analytics, model development, and AI. The last big change in computer and communication technology was captured in the third phase of privacy legislation best exemplified by the GDPR. The fourth legislative phase of privacy legislation needs to meet the challenges of 2025 and beyond. IAF model legislation will help define the way policymakers think about policy choices. The IAF will continually refine the model so that it is fit for its educational purposes.
The leading global data protection issue for the past three decades has been personal data transfer governance. The most basic business processes require data to flow, and regulators, legislators and courts have struggled to figure out how data might be protected over distance and time. The issues encompass the potential for private sector misuse of personal data, plus concerns about national security agencies demanding personal data held by the private sector. The EU-U.S. Data Protection Framework and possible interoperability with the Global Cross-Border Privacy Rules project prompts the need to overlay the fundamentals of accountability.
Education Initiatives –
The IAF delivers education about its research initiatives:
The IAF, working with partners, organizes seminars for policymakers and influencers on how legacy and new technologies work and how best practices may be applied to governance. The IAF also conducts specialized seminars for data protection authorities and policy developers, at Maastricht University in Brussels, the Data Protection Commission in Dublin Ireland, and with Canadian and U.S. officials.
The IAF collaborates with a wide range of stakeholders to organize and deliver content to conferences and policy fora for the global community interested in strategic governance so that data may serve people.
The IAF is a member of the ‘experts’ group at the OECD which advises on new guidance for privacy accountability related to advanced analytics and AI. The IAF is an invited guest at the APEC Data Privacy Subgroup and the Global Cross Border Privacy Rules project.
The IAF Chief Policy Officer is a member of the GPA Programme Advisory Committee for the 2023 annual conference in Bermuda. IAF executives have served on the committee on previous conferences in Hong Kong, Morocco, Mauritius, Poland, Mexico, United Kingdom, and Australia.