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Proposed exemptions to Data Protection Bill for certain organizations and entities.  The EU has led the way with some of the most citizen-centric privacy... UK’s New Data Privacy Rules

Proposed exemptions to Data Protection Bill for certain organizations and entities. 

The EU has led the way with some of the most citizen-centric privacy laws enacted, including the “right to be forgotten” that protects individuals from old online content. Essentially upending the “nothing is ever deleted on the internet” concept, users can petition to have information removed from search engines, including old social media posts and content that was posted on their behalf when they were children. While it does help erase someone’s track record, it also helps in situations such as wrongful arrest or childhood antics that can come back to haunt a more mature job seeker.

UK proposes exemptions to Data Protection Bill

Journalists, financial firms and anti-doping bodies could receive special exemptions from new laws to protect personal data.

Must comply

This ruling means a fair amount of extra work for sites like Google and Facebook, who must comply with the removal guidelines or face stiff fines and penalties. While tech giants might claim this is a nightmare for quality control in country-specific markets, privacy advocates say it’s been a long time coming.

Now, however, the UK is adding a new angle to the yet-to-be-enacted privacy and data laws. The laws are being put forth in order to remain in place following Brexit, and now includes provisions to exempt journalists, agencies like credit reporting firms or credit card issuing entities, and even professional sports organizations that are focused on “clean,” anti-doping measures.

Revoke consent

Essentially, if any non-exempt entities access someone’s personal data in violation of the law – meaning they managed to find it online but had no authorization to use it – then they face legal repercussions. However, that could limit important facets of journalism, and could mean that anti-doping agencies have no grounds to use information on athletes. A lot of the emphasis on the new privacy laws involves giving individuals the ability to “revoke” their consent, so in the case of specific data needs, it would prevent someone from revoking consent once they discovered they were being investigated.