The European Data Protection Supervisor last week adopted a new opinion examining the question of how effectively to safeguard data protection and privacy rights in the fast-moving world of information technology. The central thrust of the opinion is that new information technologies themselves need to be developed in a way which protects personal data and privacy, rather than simply being subject to possibly ineffective control policies once they have been developed. This so called ‘privacy by design’ approach to developing new technologies is intended to build public trust in the information society.