When it comes to data protection, a storm has long been brewing. First came worries about Alexa eavesdropping in people’s homes and recording conversations (in November 2018 a New Hampshire judge ruled that audio captured in the home of a murder victim could be used as evidence in court). Then the Cambridge Analytica-Facebook scandal broke, with data harvested off people’s Facebook accounts being used to drive political advertising, potentially affecting the U.S. election result. Consumers’ growing concern has led to harsh new data protection regulations – GDPR came into force in Europe on 25th May 2018, then the California Consumer Privacy Act became effective in the state on 1st January 2020.

During the lead up to the introduction of the General Data Protection Regulations (GDPR), customer data, privacy and consent for marketing became the obsession for pretty much every business across Europe. And now "GDPR mania" is set to come to the US, with the announcement that California is due to implement its own similar regulations known as the California Consumer Privacy Act (CCPA).

Due to come into effect on January 1^st 2020, this new set of regulations is considered by some to be the most robust privacy protection measure ever seen in the United States.

In parallel, according to leading analyst firm Gartner, between 5% to 20% of organizations have now adopted a Customer Data Platform (CDP), and many organizations across Europe have been investing in CDP technology to help mitigate risks borne out of the GDPR.