Alma Whitten, Google’s Director of Privacy for Product and Engineering, is leaving the company this summer. Forbes
first reported her move, and Google has confirmed it with us.
Whitten has been with Google since 2003, but took the role of Director of Privacy in 2010 as part of Google’s forced cleanup after the company’s Wi-Fi data collection screw up.
Part of Whitten’s mandate was to build privacy awareness and controls throughout Google’s products. That resulted in, among other things, a controversial privacy policy consolidation that went into effect on March 1, 2012.
A Google spokesperson shared this statement with us via email:
During her 10 years at Google, Alma has done so much to improve our products and protect our users. The privacy and security teams, and everyone else at Google, will continue this hard work to ensure that our users’ data is kept safe and secure.
Google also confirms that Lawrence You, an eight-year Google employee that was one of the founding members of Google’s privacy program, will take over the privacy director position. Whitten will remain at Google through June to help with the transition.
Commenti