The Professional Spanish Association of Privacy has awarded its annual prize for the Academic Career to Ricard Martínez, director of the Privacy and Digital Transformation Chair of the Universitat de València and control technician of the databases of this institution. The association awards this prize annually on the occasion of the National Congress for Privacy.

APEP is the reference association in Spain and includes experts dedicated to privacy and data protection in different fields, specialities and sectors: legal, technical, academic, both public and private, with the purpose of gaining recognition for the sector, and in turn, encourage in society and in the company and public world the need of including privacy professionals. The annual prizes not only reward the academic career but also the academic Institutions, the experts, the media and the organizations that have stood out by the promotion and the regulatory compliance in privacy.

The prize for the Academic Career recognises the teaching and researching contributions in privacy and personal data protection and it is awarded through secret voting of the members of APEP.

Ricard Martínez is Doctor in Law from the Universitat de València. He has dedicated his research to study fundamental laws concerning data protection and also different issues related to the effects of information and communication technologies and the private life. He has written different monographies dedicated to this issue, (Tecnologías de la Información, Policía y Constitución", "Una aproximación crítica a la autodeterminación informativa”) and has participated as an author and coordinator in different comments to the Development Regulation of the Organic Law of Data protection, and monographies about Law and Social Networks or Cloud Computing among others.

He currently provides his services in the Universitat de València performing functions of a delegate of data protection. He is included in the Work Group concerning Digital Rights of Citizens of the Ministry of Energy, Tourism and Digital Agenda. He coordinates the Work Group constituted by the Principals’ Conference of Spanish Universities (CRUE-TIC) for the boost of the General Regulation of data protection. He works as Director of the Official Master’s Degree in Data Protection (UNIR). Moreover, he collaborated with the civil and business society as a member of the Academic Council of Fide and co-director of its Data Protection Forum and of the Health Advisory Council of Microsoft.

He has been chief of the Transparency Service of the Valencian Provincial Council and he has collaborated with different universities as a Professor in Degree and Postgraduate Studies and has been responsible for the Studies Area of the Spanish Agency of Data Protection.