  With the increase in the number of privacy regulations, small development
teams are forced to make privacy decisions on their own. In this paper, we
conduct a mixed-method survey study, including statistical and qualitative
analysis, to evaluate the privacy perceptions, practices, and knowledge of
members involved in various phases of the Software Development Life Cycle
(SDLC). Our survey includes 362 participants from 23 countries, encompassing
roles such as product managers, developers, and testers. Our results show
diverse definitions of privacy across SDLC roles, emphasizing the need for a
holistic privacy approach throughout SDLC. We find that software teams,
regardless of their region, are less familiar with privacy concepts (such as
anonymization), relying on self-teaching and forums. Most participants are more
familiar with GDPR and HIPAA than other regulations, with multi-jurisdictional
compliance being their primary concern. Our results advocate the need for
role-dependent solutions to address the privacy challenges, and we highlight
research directions and educational takeaways to help improve privacy-aware
SDLC.
