The 11th Annual Sedona Conference International Programme on Cross-Border Data Transfers and Data Protection Laws

Gabriela Kennedy participated in The 11th Annual Sedona Conference International Programme on Cross-Border Data Transfers and Data Protection Laws (the “Programme”), which took place on 18-19 June 2019 at The Langham in Hong Kong. Gabriela was co-chair of the Programme, demonstrating her continuous involvement with Sedona, a non-profit research and educational institute dedicated to the advanced study of law and policy. The Programme took the form of the institute’s unique dialogue-based structure, allowing full engagement from the participants throughout the series of panel sessions. Approximately 70 representatives from the private and public sector, including a number of data protection authorities, such as Commissioner Stephen Kai-yi Wong, Privacy Commissioner for Personal Data, Hong Kong; Leandro Angelo Aguirre, Deputy Commissioner of the National Privacy Commission, Philippines; David N. Alfred, Chief Counsel to Singapore’s Personal Data Protection Commission, and Hisato Asada, Commissioner for International Corporation of the Personal Information Protection Commission, Japan, were brought together to assess how privacy and data security have evolved in Asia, and the impact of that evolution on cross-border data transfers and the operations of companies based inside and outside of the region.

On Day One of the Programme, Gabriela participated in the panel, “Practical Impacts of the GDPR on APAC-based Organisations”, which explored how countries in the APAC region have addressed the GDPR in their own laws and regulations, and what APAC-based organisations are doing to adjust their privacy and data security practices in response to the GDPR. Gabriela also moderated a panel on Day Two, titled “Global Data Incident and Breach Response”, where she led a dialogue on how companies manage data breach notification requirements under country-specific data protection requirements. The panel also examined the current state and potential future state of data breach notification in the APAC region, which included a discussion on enforcement trends and regulatory collaboration across jurisdictions.