UK Lawyers Claim It Is A Sign Of Things To Come

Italy's Data Protection Authority has this month issued its highest ever fines for unlawful processing of personal data and according to Irwin Mitchell, it’s a sign of things to come in the UK.

The Data Protection Authority in Italy, known as the Garante, has fined five companies a total of more than 11 million euros.

The data breach was discovered in the context of a broader financial police investigation into money laundering by a multinational company, Sigue Global Service Limited, and four other organisations.

Joanne Bone, partner and Data Protection expert at Irwin Mitchell, said:

Expert Opinion

“This case is a good indication of the direction that Data Protection Authorities are moving and should serve as a warning to all businesses. Currently in the UK, the Information Commissioner can impose fines of up to £500,000 for data breaches. This however will all change when the GDPR comes into force which introduces hefty fines for non-compliance of up to €20 million or 4% of annual worldwide turnover, whichever is bigger.” Joanne Bone - Partner

The GDPR reforms come into force on 25 May 2018 and will affect all companies who use personal data. 

Some of the key changes to be introduced by the GDPR include compulsory notification of data breaches; the obligations to be more transparent in how personal data is used; increased rights given to individuals to access the data held on them, the right to be forgotten and also data retention now being significantly under the spotlight.

To coincide with the new rules, Irwin Mitchell has launched a new data ‘health check’ service which is designed to not only help businesses to become compliant with the new GDPR, but help them manage their data in a more productive and effective way and reap the benefits from that.

Irwin Mitchell’s data health check can assess how ready a business is for the new rules, by identifying gaps and come up with a bespoke pathway to compliance.  As part of the process, Irwin Mitchell will devise a tailor made training program to ensure businesses are in the best shape possible to be GDPR compliant but also to ensure that they are using data in a productive way that can make the business more money.

Click here to find out more about how our data protection experts can help your business become GDPR compliant.