UW Privacy Office

Services

Last updated on March 31, 2023

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Overview

Using UW’s values and Privacy Principles as a foundation, the UW Privacy Office provides comprehensive services for the tri-campus community as well as specialized support for UW units and personnel that work with personal data. Combined, these services provide consistency and efficiency as we take action together for privacy at UW and the people it serves.

Privacy Office staff also contribute leadership and expertise to external professional organizations and higher education institutions on privacy-related topics.

Centralized services

The Privacy Office develops and maintains standardized and comprehensive resources necessary to safeguard personal data at the University of Washington. These include privacy-related resources described on the Take Action, Reference Materials, or Education webpages and are summarized here:

  • Data classification.
  • Accountability.
  • Policies and guidance.
  • Privacy by Design.
  • Data inventory.
  • Data requests and sharing.
  • Risk assessment and management.
  • Data protection.
  • Notices.
  • Consent processes.
  • Transparency reporting.
  • Support for specific data.
  • Incident and breach management.
  • Education and training.

In addition, the Privacy Office is building a network of privacy partners who will be local subject matter experts for UW units and trained by the Privacy Office to provide basic privacy support for their UW unit.

Our service will be expanded even more in 2023 with the creation of the following groups:

  • Privacy inner circle for privacy partners to network, stay informed about evolving privacy practices, and share lessons learned with the Privacy Office and one another.
  • Privacy Community of Practice for University personnel who work with personal data and are interested in learning about the privacy discipline.

Direct support for UW units and personnel

The Privacy Office strives to educate and empower UW units and personnel in their responsibility to protect personal data. At times, the diverse nature of the University’s academic, research, and health-care missions requires specialized advising, training, and support from the Privacy Office’s analysts regarding the centralized services described in the previous section.

The Privacy Office is also responsible for managing incidents involving personal data and making a final determination about data breach notification to external parties (e.g., regulators, constituents, etc.) as described on the linked webpages.

Get Help

Please contact the UW Privacy Office with questions.