The UK Department for Digital, Culture, Media & Sport revealed a new Data Protection Bill that aims to protect consumers’ personal information.
The goal of the bill is make it clearer how that data you give to business is used or how you can control of it.
The Data Protection Bill would also:
- Enable parents and guardians to give consent for their child’s data to be used
- Require ‘explicit’ consent to be necessary for processing sensitive personal data
- Expand the definition of ‘personal data’ to include IP addresses, internet cookies and DNA
- Update and strengthen data protection law to reflect the changing nature and scope of the digital economy
- Make it easier and free for individuals to require an organisation to disclose the personal data it holds on them
The Department for Digital, Culture, Media & Sport also stated that “new criminal offences will be created to deter organisations from either intentionally or recklessly creating situations where someone could be identified from anonymised data.” This means the bill would not only give you more control over how your data is handled, but it would also punish companies that don’t properly secure your personal information. Both changes would give tech companies reason to make sure their data policies and handling are on the up-and-up if they wish to avoid legal trouble.
The Data Protection Bill is limited to how private companies manage your data. The UK government hasn’t been quite so privacy-friendly in other regards, especially with “Snoopers’ Charter,” which gave the government unprecedented access to private information. The Court of Justice of the European Union (CJEU) later ruled against such invasive policies, but Brexit could green light the country’s surveillance efforts again. This bill does contain new rules for government data handling and collection, but its main focus is on business.
You can read the Department for Digital, Culture, Media & Sport’s full statement of intent for the Data Protection Bill here (PDF). Minister for Digital Matt Hancock also published a video on the matter on the department’s YouTube channel.
