It’s really hard to overestimate the power of small, game-animated, yellow furry bodies. Since it burst into the world 22 years ago, Pokémon continues to roll merrily along, and the craze that accompanied its release of the mobile augmented reality game Pokémon Go in 2016 made it the highest grossing mobile application in the United States.

How big was the phenomenon? At the height of its popularity, Pokémon Go generated double the daily usage of the Facebook app. It exceeded Twitter in active users and logged an astounding 645 million social interactions in the first 10 days following the 2016 release.

With all of that usage comes a tsunami of data, and the challenge for The Pokémon Co., which handles brand management, licensing and marketing of the Pokémon franchise, is to protect and properly manage that information.

“With that explosion of the user base, what comes with that is a giant lake of data,” said John Visneski (pictured), director of information security and data protection officer at The Pokémon Co. “We’re trying to figure out how to wrap our arms around that data and, as a security team, how we enable the business to move as they want to move while keeping that data secure.”

Visneski spoke with Jeff Frick (@JeffFrick), host of theCUBE, SiliconANGLE Media’s mobile livestreaming studio, during the Sumo Logic Illuminate event in San Francisco. They discussed how previous data protection work prepared it for the latest influx, the need to meet strict information controls for minors, Pokémon’s reliance on a cloud infrastructure, and the integral role played by Sumo Logic Inc. in the company’s business. (* Disclosure below.)

This week, theCUBE features John Visneski as its Guest of the Week.

GDPR paved the way

One of the ways that Visneski’s company has handled the data flood is through its previous preparations for the General Data Protection Regulation. The new regulations regarding the mandatory protection of data involving any European Union citizen, which took effect in May, helped ensure that Pokémon would have controls in place to protect its minor-age users.

In August, Niantic Inc., the developer of Pokémon Go, announced a new Niantic Kids platform that gives parents increased control over the privacy of their children while playing the game. The new platform is designed to be in full compliance with GDPR and other global child data protection regulations.

“We had a head start because we were already focused on child safety and protecting our data,” Visneski said. “There’s so many policies you need to put in place, and there’s so many new ways you need to think about how data is harvested and where it’s going to live. GDPR wasn’t a line in the sand, GDPR is just a new way of living.”

Law dictates careful approach

Pokémon finds itself in an unusual situation in that it must manage privacy data for a young audience while dealing with the reality that its users are also growing up and the parental relationship can change as well. A cornerstone of the legal requirement that game makers and social media companies alike must meet is the Child Online Privacy Protection Act.

Passed by the U.S. Congress in 1998, COPPA is managed today by the Federal Trade Commission and remains relevant as an enforcement tool against any companies that allegedly fail to protect the privacy of children under the age of 13. Just last week, the state of New Mexico filed a lawsuit against Google and Twitter claiming that some gaming apps were illegally collecting data on children.

“At The Pokémon Co., we take that pride in ownership and letting our customers own their data very seriously,” Visneski said. “When a parent lets one of their children download one of our applications, they know they’re downloading a safe space for their child to enjoy our brand.”

Key role for cloud and analytics vendors

Pokémon relies heavily on its public cloud infrastructure and works closely with cloud-native, machine data analytics provider Sumo Logic Inc. The cloud infrastructure experience has played a major role in Pokémon’s decision to build business relationships as it managed explosive gaming growth.

“Because we’re so invested in the cloud, a big thing for us is ensuring that the companies we do business with either are very much already doing cloud services or they have a plan in the very near future,” Visneski said. “What a lot of people don’t realize is that a lot of these companies have been doing business for some time on-premises, and they might not have a lot of customers yet that have been really progressive and moved a lot of their business into the cloud.”

Pokémon’s significant growth has also given Visneski renewed appreciation for the evolving vendor partnership that becomes critical when an exploding user base can strain networks and systems.

“The day and age when a vendor and customer relationship is about the customer presenting their budget and saying ‘Give me stuff’ is over,” Visneski explained. “Sumo has been phenomenal. You really get the feeling that they are concerned with making sure that you’re going to be successful as an organization.”

Before joining Pokémon, Visneski spent nine years serving in the U.S. Air Force. His tour included responsibility for engineering command and control solutions involving difficult relief efforts surrounding Hurricane Ike in 2008 and the Haitian earthquake in 2010.

Managing humanitarian crises like those can shape an understanding that people care about things they hold dear, and private information for themselves and their children rank right near the top.

“More people that are in my position are going to be looked at in their organizations to make really due diligent efforts at understanding what kind of data we’re taking in, why we are taking it in, what’s the business justification, and how long we keep it,” Visneski said. “We take security and privacy very seriously.”

Watch the complete video interview below, and be sure to check out more of SiliconANGLE’s and theCUBE’s coverage of the Sumo Logic Illuminate event. (* Disclosure: TheCUBE is a paid media partner for Sumo Logic Illuminate. Neither Sumo Logic Inc., the event sponsor, nor other sponsors have editorial control over content on theCUBE or SiliconANGLE.)

Photo: SiliconANGLE