Minna Paltiel

Minna is a PhD candidate and part of the HeLEX Centre (Health, Law and Emerging Technologies) at the Melbourne Law School.  Minna researches in privacy and data protection law as it applies to health information, and in particular genomic information.  Her PhD focuses on international sharing of genomic information between divergent legal regimes and the impact on privacy rights of individuals.  Minna’s interests include privacy and data protection, health law and bioethics, information technology law, intellectual property and media law.  Minna is a member of the Patron Data Governance Committee, Department of General Practice (University of Melbourne).

Minna previously worked in the litigation departments of top-tier law firms as well as with ASIC, and was Senior Associate to the Honourable Justice Sifris of the Supreme Court of Victoria.  In addition, Minna worked as a teaching associate at Monash University Faculty of Law. While undertaking the PhD, Minna continues to practice in a boutique corporate law firm.

Minna holds a Juris Doctor (Masters of Law) from Monash University, for which she was awarded the Supreme Court Prize, as well as a first-class honours degree in Psychology from the University of Melbourne and a Masters (Education and Counselling) from the Hebrew University, Jerusalem.  Minna has presented at workshops and conferences on international data sharing and secondary uses of health data and has published regarding intellectual property and consumer protection on the internet in the LexisNexis Internet Law Bulletin.

Thesis Title

Protecting individuals' privacy rights in international transfer of genomic information: a comparison of privacy and data protection law in Australia and in Israel

Thesis Summary

Advances in genomic research and precision medicine rely upon genomic data being widely shared, including in international collaborations.  However, cross-border flows of large amounts of genomic data, and the unique nature of these data, present particular challenges to the protection of individuals’ privacy, which become more complex when genomic data is shared between jurisdictions with divergent regulatory regimes.

My thesis examines the protections afforded genomic information in two non-harmonised jurisdictions, Australia and Israel, and the impact upon these protections when the information is transferred between the two.  I employ a comparative analysis of the privacy legislation of each, and the underlying conceptualisations of privacy expressed in their laws, to identify incongruencies which may lead to protections being diminished, altered or lost when genomic information moves from one jurisdiction to the other.  I aim to draw on factors highlighted in the comparative analysis to propose responses to better maintain the protection of individuals’ privacy in international genomic data-sharing.

Supervisors

• Professor Jane Kaye
• Associate Professor Mark Taylor

• Privacy Law and Data Protection
• Health Law and Bioethics
• Information Technology Law
• Intellectual Property
• Media and Communications Law