Purpose Limitation
The principle that personal data should be collected only for specified, explicit and legitimate purposes and not further processed in ways incompatible with those purposes without appropriate authorisation.
In plain language
Data collected for one reason should not be used for something completely different. If customers gave you their email for shipping updates, you should not feed it into an AI marketing system without asking permission first.
Why this matters
Purpose limitation is a core privacy principle enshrined in the Privacy Act that directly affects AI governance. Your data governance policies must track the original purpose of data collection and ensure AI applications do not repurpose data without proper authorisation and consent.
Relevance
GovernanceThe Privacy Act's Australian Privacy Principle 1 requires organisations to manage personal information according to stated purposes; AI systems that repurpose data breach this obligation and expose the organisation to regulatory action.
Related terms
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