A tri-polar privacy world: China, EU, US conflict on rights regimes

There’s an old African saying: When two elephants fight, it is the grass that suffers. And when elephants make love, it is the grass that suffers. Libertine innuendo aside, what happens when three elephants rub elbows? That is the as-yet unanswered question that insiders are asking about data privacy regimes, especially those involving biometrics collected via facial recognition and other methods. The three giants are China, the United States and the European Union, each of which will greatly influence how digital privacy is governed. It does not look like a good time to be a blade of grass. No one thinks one regulatory philosophy will encompass the globe soon. But the concepts of protecting individual privacy among the three differ so markedly — to the point of complete opposition in the case of the United States and the EU — that it is unclear how they can co-exist right now.