Data privacy laws have been created to strengthen the rights of individuals whose personal information is used by organizations to provide their products and services. These laws aim to protect the personal information that individuals provide as well as impose strict sanctions on their misuse by the organizations whether they are a non-profit establishment or a business entity.
The General Data Protection Regulation which came into effect on May 25, 2018, is widely recognized as the initiator of Data Privacy Laws for the citizens of the European Union (EU). However, since Brexit’s official confirmation on Jan 1, 2021, the EU’s GDPR no longer applies to the UK. The UK has amended the Data Protection Act (DPA) 2018 and re-named it UK-GDPR. In this article, we will establish the difference between EU-GDPR and UK-GDPR.
Here are the 3 main differences between GDPR and the DPA 2018:
- GDPR or EU-GDPR aims at protecting the personal information of the citizens of the EU and the EEA (European Economic Area). This includes any organization or establishment that conducts business with a citizen of the EU. The DPA 2018 or UK-GDPR has amended the previous 1995 Data Protective Directive to match with the regulations mentioned in EU-GDPR.
- The principles and provisions of UK-GDPR mirror the EU-GDPR with minor modifications. So, any organization or business entity doing business or providing their products and services to a citizen of the UK must comply with the UK-GDPR. Similarly, any organization or business enterprise based in the UK must comply with the EU-GDPR to provide products and services to a citizen of the EU.
- The major difference between the UK-GDPR and EU-GDPR comes in the form of the former data privacy law’s regulations related to the areas of law enforcement, intelligence services, and immigration that were not provided in the latter.
Just like EU-GDPR regulations, the UK-GDPR regulations require all organizations with websites must obtain prior consent before collecting, processing, and storing the personal information of users. They must update their privacy and cookie policies according to the latest UK-GDPR guidelines along with the EU-GDPR guidelines. Organizations must ensure that they are knowledgeable on the various guidelines of GDPR and Data Protection Act 2018. They can use training and conduct security checks on their websites to prevent breaches of these data privacy laws.
Educating the employees of the organization about these important data privacy laws of EU-GDPR and UK-GDPR will allow the organization to conduct their daily business operations properly according to the guidelines mentioned in these regulations. This will also ensure that these organizations do not misuse the private information of their customers that they have stored in their information systems. Violations of the EU-GDPR, as well as the UK-GDPR, are heavily fined. Thus, organizations must update their IT security and compliance policies with the latest guidelines.
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