Jonathan Cantor
Jonathan Cantor
Chief Privacy Officer & Director of Open Gov, DOC
Mr. Cantor was selected as the Department of Commerce’s first Chief Privacy Officer and Director of Open Government in September 2010. He is responsible for privacy and data protection policy for the entire Department and serves as the key advisor on issues relating to compliance with the Privacy Act, E-Government Act provisions on privacy, and other privacy laws and mandates. He also leads the Department’s open government and transparency activities as well as its Freedom of Information Act and Federal Advisory Committee Act programs. Finally, he also directs the Department’s directives management process, which prescribes the management structure and organizational arrangements of the Department of Commerce.
Before joining the Department, Mr. Cantor served as the Executive Director for Privacy and Disclosure at the Social Security Administration. In his tenure at Social Security, the agency bolstered its considerable reputation in citizen-focused service and leadership in privacy protection. He helped design the agency’s first privacy impact assessment process and bolstered the agency’s web privacy policies, ensuring compliance with the numerous applicable laws and mandates. He also revamped the Social Security Administration’s privacy regulations, helping lead the transition to a modern privacy program designed for the Internet age. He also led the agency’s efforts in reducing its Freedom of Information Act request backlog, reducing wait times in the oldest cases from nearly two years to just over two months.
Previously, Mr. Cantor was the Deputy Executive Director of the Office of Privacy and Disclosure at Social Security and served as the Freedom of Information Act Officer. He was directly responsible for moving the agency to a new electronic Freedom of Information Act process, and helped manage a large contract to develop the needed hardware and software. He also worked for several years in Social Security’s Office of the General Counsel as a staff attorney, where he focused on the Freedom of Information Act, privacy mandates, data sharing, contract and other administrative and general law issues.
Mr. Cantor received his J.D. with honors from the George Washington University Law School, and is a member of the Maryland State Bar and Supreme Court Bar. He received his A.B. cum laude from Duke University. He represents the Department on the Federal CIO Council Privacy Committee and is co-Chair of its Innovation and Emerging Technology Subcommittee. He is a member of the International Association of Privacy Professionals and the Government Technology Research Alliance Security Council, and is a Certified Information Privacy Professional (CIPP) and CIPP in U.S. government privacy (CIPP/G). He speaks frequently on privacy policy, practices, the Freedom of Information Act and open government.