On the 10th January 2017, the European Commission proposed the ePrivacy Regulation (EPR), a law on privacy and electronic communication that aims at increasing protection of EU citizen’s private life and ‘reinforcing trust and security in the Digital Single Market by updating the legal framework on the ePrivacy’.
One year on from the European Commission’s EPR proposal, a lively discussion is continuing and Microsoft would like to add to the debate with technical detail and explanations on how innovative technologies can be applied, while data security and confidentiality is ensured and personal data is protected.
Electronic communication and collaboration services such as Outlook.com, Skype, Gmail, Slack and OneDrive carry valuable private and confidential communications that need protection. But these same services also provide a means for attackers to steal information or seize control of users’ computers for nefarious purposes, via viruses, worms, spam, phishing attacks, and other forms of malware.
Preventing the theft of user information and the dissemination of malware is a core feature of electronic communication and collaboration services. This requires significant processing of users’ communications and data both in-transit and after delivery. This processing can and should be done without compromising the user’s privacy or the confidentiality of their communications.
In a first of a series of posts on the technical and organizational measures required to ensure confidentiality of data, Jim Kleewein, Technical Fellow at Microsoft, explains the approach to protecting email data and services.
Read the post here.