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Data Privacy and Security: Exploring Lucrative Career Paths With an M.A. in Law

In today’s interconnected world, where data flows freely and privacy concerns are at the forefront of discussions, the demand for legal professionals well-versed in data privacy and data security has never been higher. From safeguarding sensitive information to ensuring compliance with a sea of regulations, these experts play a pivotal role in today’s digital landscape. 

What is the difference between data privacy and data security?

In the realm of digital information and technology, the terms data privacy and data security are often used interchangeably, but they represent distinct aspects of protecting information. Knowing the difference is crucial in comprehending the broader landscape of data and privacy in the legal field.

Data privacy focuses on safeguarding personal information from unauthorized access and misuse. It ensures that collected data is used ethically and respects individual rights. This involves obtaining consent, controlling access, and adhering to regulations such as GDPR and CCPA.

Data Security: Safeguarding Against Threats

Data security aims to defend data from cyber threats and breaches. It involves measures such as encryption, firewalls, and access controls to prevent unauthorized access and protect against malicious actors.

The Importance of Data Privacy and Security 

Data privacy and security training equips professionals to handle data ethically, securely, and in compliance with laws. It is essential for data privacy careers, allowing individuals to protect sensitive information and navigate legal complexities. Curious about the diverse career opportunities in this field? Here are some of the jobs available to those with an M.A. in Law specializing in data and privacy security.

Data Privacy Manager

A data privacy manager is responsible for overseeing an organization’s data privacy policies, ensuring compliance, and developing strategies to protect sensitive information. With the increasing importance of data protection and evolving regulations, this role is in high demand due to its critical role in safeguarding privacy.

What Does a Data Privacy Manager Do?

  • Ensure compliance with data protection laws and regulations.
  • Conduct privacy impact assessments to identify potential risks.
  • Develop and implement data privacy policies and practices.
  • Protect sensitive information and maintain confidentiality.

How Much Does a Data Privacy Manager Make?

The expected salary range of a data privacy manager in the U.S. typically ranges from $112,200 and $145,700 with an average annual salary of $128,000 according to Salary.com.*

*Data gathered in 2023

Director of Data Security Policy

A director of data security policy leads the development and implementation of data security protocols, safeguards against breaches, and establishes comprehensive security measures. In a digital landscape fraught with cybersecurity challenges, this role is essential and valued for its impact on organizational resilience.

What Does a Director of Data Security Policy Do?

  • Develop and implement data security policies and protocols.
  • Establish and maintain comprehensive security protocols.
  • Safeguard against data breaches, cyber threats, and unauthorized access.
  • Provide leadership in maintaining data integrity across the organization.

How Much Does a Director of Data Security Policy Make?

The expected salary range of a Director of Data Security Policy in the U.S. typically ranges from $168,290 and $206,990 with an average annual salary of $186,590 according to Salary.com.*

*Data gathered in 2023

Data Privacy Analyst

A data privacy analyst analyzes data management practices for vulnerabilities, ensures compliance, and collaborates with legal teams to address privacy concerns. With data breaches becoming more frequent, this role is pivotal for maintaining organizational trust.

What Does a Data Privacy Analyst Do?

  • Analyzes an organization’s data management practices for vulnerabilities.
  • Ensures compliance with data protection laws and guidelines.
  • Identifies risks related to data breaches and noncompliance.
  • Collaborates closely with legal teams to address privacy concerns.

How Much Does a Data Privacy Analyst Make?

According to Comparably,* data privacy analysts in the U.S. have an average salary range of $65,000 to $98,400. The median annual salary for Data Privacy Analysts is $82,000.

*Data gathered in 2023

Business Analyst for Data

A business analyst for data ensures that data-driven initiatives align with legal standards, bridges legal requirements with business operations, and guides organizations in ethical-data-related decisions. In an era of increasing data-driven decision-making, this role demands a unique blend of legal and business expertise.

What Does a Business Analyst for Data Do?

  • Ensures data-driven initiatives align with legal and ethical standards.
  • Bridges legal requirements with business operations and strategies.
  • Collaborates with legal and business teams to facilitate compliant practices.
  • Guides organizations in making ethically sound data-related decisions.

How Much Does a Business Analyst for Data Make?

Zippia* reports that the average salary range for a business analyst for data is between $55,000 and $101,000 with the median salary being $75,461.

*Data gathered in 2023

Building Your Future in Data Privacy & Security

The world of data privacy and security is ever-evolving, with diverse and rewarding career opportunities awaiting those who possess an M.A. in Law. By specializing in this field, you gain the knowledge, skills, and legal foundation needed to excel in roles that shape the future of data protection. 
Discover how, with an M.A. in Law from The Colleges of Law, you’re not just stepping into a career; you’re stepping into the future of data protection and legal innovation. Begin your journey today.

Sheri Valley: Serving the Community Where It Is

The Colleges of Law alumna Sheri Valley got her JD later in life so she could help those in need no matter their status.

Pursuing a psychology degree later in life, Sheri Valley was once on track to become a family therapist. “After working for years as a court reporter, I was blindsided when I witnessed a family member’s first psychotic episode. I decided to enroll in some psychology classes to learn everything I could to help,” Valley says. “The next thing I know, I was taking a full course load.”

She graduated summa cum laude with a bachelor’s degree in psychology from California State University Channel Islands. Her focus of study was psychology in the legal system, but when she had the opportunity to participate in a mock trial, her career plans changed.

Valley volunteered to participate in the mock trial because the case involved someone who committed a crime while experiencing a manic episode. It was a study conducted in Valley’s criminal psychology class to show the biases of juries, but what it also revealed to Valley was her own desire to become a lawyer and advocate for people who live with mental health issues.

Law career unlocked

Once she knew she wanted to practice law, Valley’s path to getting there was different from that of many 20-something undergraduate students. Having married young, Valley was an older prospective student, and even her friends and family weren’t sure she could do it.

“I had basically no support when I started,” Valley says. “I applied without telling anyone and wasn’t sure I’d even get in. But I did.” The lack of support from some people in her life only made her more determined to become successful to prove everyone wrong.

The Colleges of Law, with its encouragement of students to work toward their legal goals no matter what stage of life they are in, seemed a natural fit for Valley’s unique needs. As  a student there, she earned several scholastic awards, a Witkin Award, and the Women Lawyers of Ventura County’s Mary Sullivan Scholarship Award.

Valley also worked as an intern at the Ventura County Public Defender’s Office during her time at The Colleges of Law. Being at the public defender’s office, she saw the ways the legal system was helping those who faced mental health challenges, but also the ways it was failing them. She participated in the “Assist” task force and drafted the first legal protocols to support the implementation of Laura’s Law in Ventura County.

Laura’s Law was enacted to allow families and loved ones to get help for the person in their life who is suffering from serious mental illness yet is reluctant to accept the treatment they need. Caseworkers meet those in need where they are—whether that’s a park bench, a shelter, or somewhere else—and keep showing up to meet with and encourage everyone along the way to voluntarily accept mental health treatment. Valley worked to figure out how the law could best serve those in need and collaborated with multiple county agencies, Ventura County Behavioral Health, the public defender’s office, Ventura County Counsel, and other experts.

One in five American adults experiences some sort of mental illness, and one in 25 experience a serious mental illness. As someone personally touched by the effects of mental illness on families, Valley is an advocate for families and loved ones who need support, assisting them in finding resources, including the National Alliance on Mental Illness, which Valley says was a lifesaver for her when she was searching for knowledge and support.                                                       

Practicing what she preaches

During her two years as a certified law clerk with the public defender’s office, Valley worked diligently in the mental health and veterans’ courts. She resolved 58 legal cases for veterans at Ventura County Stand Down, an annual event that offers homeless vets free legal and medical services. Yet Valley knew that once she passed the bar, she would only be able to work in mental health court if she stayed in the public defender’s office. Instead, she applied to private practice law firms.

“Unless someone gets in trouble for committing a crime or is being involuntarily hospitalized, lawyers’ jobs generally do not interact with those who live with severe mental illness. But there are so many other ways I try to help parents and loved ones find the resources they need,” Valley says.

“Many of us want to help those who live with mental illness avoid jail and hospitalization,” Valley adds. “With programs like Ventura County Behavioral Health’s Assist Program (Laura’s Law), National Alliance on Mental Illness (NAMI), and Turning Point Foundation of Ventura County, another service that helps those with mental illness get jobs and maintain stability, there are a lot of programs where they can find help. There’s never going to be enough resources, but helping someone navigate the system is a start.”

Valley’s first case as a newly minted attorney still looks like serendipity to the outside eye. Drawing again on her psychology degree and background, she worked on a national product liability case for victims of electroconvulsive therapy products who suffered brain injury.

“Seeking treatment for mental health issues, these plaintiffs were struggling every day with all sorts of cognitive issues after being treated with these shock therapy machines,” Valley says.

In her newest venture as an associate at the law firm of Myers, Widders, Gibson, Jones & Feingold, LLP, Valley works on construction defect and insurance litigation, focusing on bad faith claims against insurance companies that, “inter alia,” are not willing to pay the insured’s claim. Whether Valley is helping people fight their insurance company for benefits or assisting in navigating the Ventura County Behavioral Health system, she’s serving her community.

Ventura County from the start

As a longtime Camarillo resident, Valley praises The Colleges of Law for providing support to students who are in unique situations. “I wouldn’t have been able to do any of this without The Colleges of Law. We had access to practicing lawyers and judges from Day One. In Ventura County, everyone knows and respects The Colleges of Law because of the teachers and the lawyers who are currently working in the field.”

Oh, and eventually her friends and family came around. “After I passed the first year of law school, they realized I was really doing this, and now they couldn’t be more supportive.”

A Pride Month Warning

Recent attacks by politicians on the LGBTQ+ community echo a dark past.

Pride Month is celebrated in June to honor the 1969 Stonewall Uprising, the birth of the modern-day gay rights movement in the United States. In recent years, it has been a time to celebrate the movement’s successes, the slow but steady march to legal equality and social acceptance. This story of progress fits the comfortable narrative of American exceptionalism, but it ignores the rise of stochastic terrorism against the LGBTQ+ community and the historical echoes from Nazi Germany.

Before 1933, Germany was a center of LGBTQ+ community and culture. Berlin was home to nearly 100 gay and lesbian bars and cafes. It hosted the world-renowned Institute of Sexology, an academic foundation devoted to research and the advocacy of LGBTQ+ rights. The Institute was a pioneer in gender-affirming care and coined the term transsexual. It promoted “justice through science” and championed equal rights across the Weimer Republic.

In May 1933, just three months after Hitler took office, the Institute was raided, and all the books in the library were emptied onto the street and burned. At the book burning, Joseph Goebbels, chief propagandist for the Nazi Party, announced, “No to decadence and moral corruption! Yes to decency and morality in family and state!” What began as a project of “protecting” German youth from the perceived immorality of homosexuality would become a mechanism for genocide. The Nazi ideal was of white, heterosexual masculinity masquerading as genetic superiority. Anyone who strayed from that norm was deemed immoral and worthy of total eradication.

We hear echoes in 2023 America of the Nazi Party’s propaganda and the violence it wrought. Politicians have used the same mantra of protecting children to justify anti-LGBTQ+ legislation, including banning books with LGBTQ+ characters or themes. The marriage of white supremacy and homophobia was clear in 2017 when hundreds of avowed white nationalist marched in Charlottesville waving Confederate and Nazi flags while yelling antisemitic, racist and homophobic slurs.

When Adolph Hitler took power, he described a country in crisis due to moral decay and an opposing party with a “totally destructive ideology”. Similar messages have emerged in the United States. In a 2022 campaign ad, Senator Marco Rubio said about a children’s story hour hosted by drag queens, “The radical left will destroy America if we don’t stop them. They indoctrinate children and try to turn boys into girls.” Florida Governor Ron DeSantis tweeted that anyone who opposes a bill dubbed the “Don’t Say Gay” law is “probably a groomer or at least you don’t denounce” it. His use of the term “groomer” reflects an age-old homophobic trope equating homosexuality with pedophilia.

Beyond inflammatory rhetoric, another tactic of Nazi Germany has surfaced: deputizing citizens to police the moral behavior of their neighbors. In 1933, the Gestapo encouraged tips or “denunciations” from the public about immoral behavior that violated the law. Today, in the U.S., some states are introducing bills to allow for criminal prosecution of librarians and educators for distributing “material that is harmful to minors,” thus allowing individual parents  to impose their moral code on all children. A middle school teacher in Illinois was placed on leave and ultimately resigned after parents called the police claiming that she was “grooming students” with access to young adult novels with LGBTQ+ characters. In Missouri, parents called the police about the availability of “sexually explicit” books at the library.

Not surprisingly, the codification of anti-LGBTQ+ sentiment and the use of inflammatory language has resulted in an increase in violence against the LGBTQ+ community.  The U.S. Department of Homeland Security issued a warning about domestic terrorism, citing among other things the November 2022 mass shooting at Club Q, an LGBTQ+ bar in Colorado Springs. GLADD found 191 incidents of anti-LGBTQ+ threats since Pride Season 2022. These threats have taken the form of seemingly benign actions such as product and store boycotts to more menacing actions such as bomb threats.

Although there is no direct comparison nor moral equivalence between Nazi Germany and current events, the early parallels are difficult and dangerous to ignore. Hitler moved slowly, escalating his policies over years, aided by the silence and indifference around him. Elie Wiesel, a Nobel Peace Prize winner and Holocaust survivor, said, “We must always take a side. Neutrality helps the oppressor, never the victim. Silence encourages the tormentor, never the tormented.” Take a side this June. Attend a Pride event, and do not allow the seeds of intolerance and bullying to sprout.

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