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Episode 274 – Liz MacPherson, Deputy Privacy Commissioner, Office of the Privacy Commissioner, New Zealand

In Episode 274 of The Data Diva Talks Privacy Podcast, Debbie Reynolds, The Data Diva, talks with Liz MacPherson, Deputy Privacy Commissioner at the Office of the Privacy Commissioner of New Zealand, about how privacy functions as a critical guardrail for innovation rather than a barrier to progress. The discussion focuses on New Zealand’s purpose and context-based privacy framework and why strong privacy foundations enable faster, safer, and more trustworthy data use across government and industry.

The conversation explores a landmark case involving the use of facial recognition technology in supermarkets, where regulators, businesses, and independent evaluators worked together to test effectiveness, necessity, and proportionality before deployment. Debbie and Liz unpack why biometric data demands heightened scrutiny, how privacy impact assessments and real-world trials can reduce risk, and why facial recognition is not a plug-and-play technology. They also discuss the importance of human oversight, data quality, access controls, transparency to the public, and the risks of bias and misidentification when systems are poorly governed.

Debbie and Liz also examine New Zealand’s Biometric Processing Privacy Code and its role in setting clear thresholds for biometric use, including limits on categorization and inference. The episode highlights why data retention is one of the most overlooked sources of organizational risk, how unnecessary data creates downstream harm, and why treating personal information as a treasure rather than an asset to be exploited builds long-term trust. Liz emphasizes that organizations succeed when they place people at the center of data decisions and design privacy as part of the full information lifecycle.

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Debbie Reynolds Consulting, LLC