What's New in Data Protection?

Following Brexit it was inevitable there were going to be ongoing changes to the UK data protection regulations. Here we want to bring you up to date with all the recent, important changes.

ICO-related news

The way data protection fines are going to be distributed is changing.

The ICO hasn’t been shy about issuing large fines in the past. In recent years it has fined British Airways £20million for a 2019 data breach. Marriot International also faced a fine of £18.4million.

Many believed that the ICO benefited from these fines directly, however that wasn’t the case. All fines went to the treasury’s consolidated fund which is made up of all government revenue.

Things are now changing as the ICO has agreed a deal to access a slice of the fines it issues. This is capped at £7.5million per financial year and is said to be to cover specific, externally audited litigation costs.

The government wants to ensure that this doesn’t lead to an incentive for the ICO to issue more fines and harsher penalties, so there are some hurdles for the ICO to access a pre-agreed, specific retained amount each year.

That said, we do expect this to inevitably lead to harsher punishments and additional fines levied.

Commenting on the new deal, the ICO’s chief regulatory officer, James Dipply Johnstone said, “being able to recover some of our litigation costs will form an important part of ensuring that the ICO has the right tools to do our job.”

So far, all the ICO’s 2022 enforcement notices are to related to business to consumer (B2C) organisations. To make sure your B2B organisation continues to avoid fines, it pays to look into using a tool like ClearCrypt so that you’re always sharing data in a compliant way.

The UK government’s plans

The UK government are looking to reform the Data Protection Act 2018 and the UK GDPR.

The objectives are to:

·        Reduce burdens on businesses

·        Protect consumers from nuisance calls and unnecessary cookies

·        Modernise the Information Commissioner’s Office

·        Enable the innovative use of data

·        Empower international trade

Digital Secretary, Nadine Dorries commented:

“Today is an important step in cementing post-Brexit Britain’s position as a science and tech superpower. Our new Data Reform Bill will make it easier for businesses and researchers to unlock the power of data to grow the economy and improve society, but retains our global gold standard for data protection.”

You can read more about the reforms here.

We have been through these changes in detail and can confirm that ClearCrypt will continue to ensure its users and clients are entirely compliant when processing personal data in Europe.

About ClearCrypt

ClearCrypt allows you to exchange personal data quickly and securely in a fully compliant manner. We also continue to innovate as required as the data protection laws evolve.

You can use ClearCrypt to:

·        Compare: encrypted comparison of data between two organisations in a secure environment, maintaining compliance with data protection regulations and privacy and security policies

·        Exclude: find out what data your customer already has and exclude it without the need for time-consuming paperwork and the setup of data processing agreements

·        Suppress: securely provide your data suppression list to a third party with the knowledge and assurance that they can only view data already in their possession

·        Target: quickly discover the overlap in data between you and your partner/channel network with complete confidentiality

Data providers and brokers, marketing agencies and technology companies all use ClearCrypt to compare two sets of data.

You can do this using ClearCrypt without swapping personal details.

Find out more about how it works here or contact us today.