NDPC canvasses homegrown solutions to boost data privacy

Chief Executive Officer of Nigeria Data Protection Commission (NDPC), Dr Vincent Olatunji, has stressed the need to develop indigenous solutions to drive the data privacy ecosystem in the country.

To this end, the bureau organised its first hackathon to generate local ideas for implementing data protection laws.

Speaking at an event organised by the NDPC, in collaboration with the Nigeria Computer Society (NCS), ISACA Abuja chapter and Innov8 Tech Hub, as part of the activities to mark the 2024 National Data Privacy Week, Olatunji noted that the Nigeria Data Protection Act (NDPA) was signed in June 2023.

He stressed the need to engage in policy dialogue and look at emerging issues around the law for proper implementation, asserting that any application developed in the country must comply with the data privacy law.

“We are having a hackathon for the first time, and we are trying to look at indigenous solutions that can address some of the challenges in implementing the law.”

We are looking at challenges in terms of the law itself, investigations, reporting breaches, self-assessment and evaluating the applications from the hackathon to see if they comply with the data privacy standards.

“There are prizes to be won after this competition. After looking at them, we take up the ones that can address some of the things we are trying to do now, immediately, to where couldbe incubated and implemented, and we work with them in a way that will be beneficial to them. Some of their solutions can be part of the global brands to address the issue of privacy globally,” he said.

The goals of the data privacy week, Olatunji explained, is to raise awareness, build capacity and develop solutions in the data privacy sector.

He expressed excitement with the level of performance from the students, saying the government’s efforts in educating people on data protection were manifesting.

One of the groups, which participated in the Hackathon, Privalon, led by Halleluyah Oludele presented the ‘ChainVote Solution’ to address identity management in the voting system through the decentralisation of data.

The three finalists consist of students from Nile University, University of Abuja and University of Ibadan and the prizes are N750,000 for the first position, N500,000 for the second position and N250,000 for the third position.