Meet the 62-Year-Old Irishman Defending Your Online Privacy

When Billy Hawkes was appointed as Ireland's data protection commissioner in 2005, Gmail was still in beta; Facebook was only open to a handful of colleges; and Steve Jobs was secretly designing a mobile phone.

Now, those tools are at the center of millions of people's lives, helping them manage their information by cataloging reams of it. And Hawkes, a 62-year-old, white-haired politician, has become the first line of defense for privacy-conscious Europeans. Apple, Google, Facebook and LinkedIn are among the companies that have established their European headquarters in Ireland, helping them to attain some well-documentedcorporate tax benefits. In turn, that has given Hawkes unprecedented oversight on how the sensitive information of users is collected and stored.