Companies Underemphasize Importance of Data They Retain, AT&T Veteran Quinn Says

Former AT&T Senior Executive Vice President Bob Quinn said he joined Wilkinson Barker (see the personals section of the Jan. 4 issue) with an eye on building its privacy practice. Chief privacy officer at AT&T for five years, Quinn left in May because of controversy over the company's hiring of Donald Trump personal lawyer Michael Cohen (see 1805110029). Now, Quinn said he wants to focus on privacy. “With all of the data breaches, companies have spent a lot of money in the area of cyber focused on data breach and trying to understand where their weaknesses are, because nobody wants to be the next headline,” Quinn told us Thursday. “In the area of privacy, I don’t think people have spent the money to understand what data they’re holding onto, what data they’re collecting, how they’re using it, what disclosures they’re making to consumers.” Lack of focus on the collection of data “left a bad taste in the mouth” of European regulators and that’s why they approved the EU general data protection regulation, he said. Similarly, that’s why California lawmakers approved a state privacy law last summer (see 1806280054), he said. “Ultimately, we’re going to have a federal law and right now is the time where people are really kind of screaming for more information on privacy, especially with this debate heating up in the next year on Capitol Hill,” Quinn said. “I think a privacy law is coming.” How GDPR unfolds will have an impact in the U.S., he said.