Data Privacy Day 2026

Today Wednesday January 28, 2026 is international Data Privacy Day, or Data Protection Day in the EU, or just another Wednesday in the rest of the world. This is the kind of event that is observed by business people who want to avoid regulatory purgatory, regulators, government officials, and concerned professionals. Of course I attended and arrived just on time to not have to embarrassingly open the closed conference doors while a speaker is in the middle of a speech. The human voice rarely harmonizes well with the sound of a creaking door.

The Information and Privacy Commissioner of Ontario (IPC) organized a seminar in celebration of privacy after publishing a report on the responsible deployment of AI. Titled Trustworthy AI in Health: The Promise, Perils, and Protections, the seminar featured talks focused on machine learning systems deployed in Canadian healthcare.

Across sections, there was a general recognition that the AI systems were as good as the data they are fed and that the “out-of-the-box” software does not work well, requiring fine-tuning on Canadian healthcare data. Dr. Amol Verna, Clinician-Scientist at St. Michael's Hospital in Toronto, made sure to remind the audience that American data differs significantly from Canadian data.

The first panel featured physicians and researchers talking about how AI adoption in healthcare is on its way, but that deployment was lagging. There was a careful undertone to not fall into accelerationism, but nonetheless the “break it now, fix later” mantra is alive and well. There were some voices that underscored the risks of market consolidation, specifically mentioning Epic Systems and its increasing healthcare market dominance as a glaring example.

The second panel addressed the consultation of different groups in AI data and governance, from business to Indigenous groups. One audience member asked something along the lines of, “If AI is trained on data that was obtained unethically, isn’t the use of these AI systems morally objectionable?” In response, Kwame McKenzie, CEO of the Wellesley Institute, highlighted the need for a community framework around data, one where people have control over the information they share and are consulted adequately to prevent data privacy abuses.

Having exhausted my attention span for the day, I left before the final panel began, and I came out of the talks with more questions than answers. In the politics of rupture that Canada is attempting, how does Canadian AI infrastructure in healthcare get built? How does privacy regulation ensure the democratic use and proliferation of patient data? 

My ultimate question: Are all these worries pointless because we will be ruled by One Company Under God, some looming corporate monopoly?

Time will tell, but this was a neat event and shed much light on an area of tech I admit I have little expertise on.

Happy Data Privacy Day, Canada.

Happy Data Protection Day, Europe.

Happy Wednesday, World!