Reform UK may breach data laws with free energy bills competition
- Reform UK risks breaching data protection laws with its competition to win free energy bills for a year, lawyers and data experts have warned.
- It was announced by Nigel Farage announced the lottery to advertise his latest policy to cut energy bills.
- However, to enter the competition, entrants have to disclose not only their name, email, and telephone number, but also how they voted at the last election and how they intend to vote at the next one, something experts warned could be unlawful.
- Mariano Delli Santi, legal and policy officer at Open Rights Group, a campaign for digital rights, said “Reform are asking the public to hand over sensitive data about their voting habits without being transparent about how it will be used.” This appears to be a clear breach of transparency obligations under UK data protection law.
- A second lawyer, said that a key principle is data minimisation, meaning that data should only be collected that is necessary for the purposes and Reform should only by collecting what they need for the purpose of the prize draw.
UK Investigates Leak of Information from Meeting about U.S. Base Request
- The British government has opened an inquiry into how details of a top-secret national security meeting to discuss a U.S. request to use British military bases at the start of the Iran conflict were leaked to a journalist.
- Initially, Prime Minister Keir Starmer blocked the U.S. from using the air base of Diego Garcia in the Indian Ocean and RAF Fairford in England, before later allowing the U.S. to use the bases or “defensive” strikes against Iranian targets.
- It was reported by the Spectator magazine that Senior ministers were divided over whether to grant the initial U.S. request. Starmer was in favour of giving the U.S. permission to use the bases, however, there was opposition from his energy minister Ed Miliband and his finance minister Rachel Reeves.
- Antonia Romeo, the government’s most senior official, said in a letter to an opposition party politician that the leak inquiry had started. The government “is conducted an inquiry into this unauthorised disclosure which draws on the full range of powers at their disposal”, he wrote in the letter.
United States
US Sen. Blackburn proposes AI Framework to Protect Children, Copyrights
- U.S. Congress may be working quicker to create a federal artificial intelligence policy. U.S. Sen. Marsha Blackburn, R-Tenn., introduced a fresh discussion draft 18 March aimed at kickstarting lawmaker dialogue toward delivering on the White House’s goal to preempt state-level AI legislation.
- This draft framework primarily focuses on protections and requirements around children’s online safety and copyright issues, combining some of her previously introduced bills to create preemptive legislation.
- The Children’s provisions are based on the proposed Kids Online Safety Act while copyright portions are taken from the NO FAKES Act. For children under age 17, the framework would place a duty of care on developers while requiring AI chatbot safeguards, data protection standards, and a consumer mechanism to report AI harms.
- The draft also requires third-party audit for bias and discrimination based on political affiliation, and measures to boost AI innovation.
Europe
Luxembourg Court Scraps Amazon’s €746m Data Privacy Fine
- The €746 million penalty imposed against Amazon by the Luxembourg National Commission for Data Protection (CNPD) for failures to comply with the EU General Protection Regulation (GDPR) has been annulled.
- The Administrative Court of Luxembourg held that the CNPD had failed to carry out two critical analyses in handing down its decision and returned the case to the watchdog for reconsideration.
- It had made history at the time as the largest fine ever levied by a European data protection watchdog under the GDPR and remains the second largest penalty to date. The €1.2 billion fine brought by the European Data Protection Board (EDPB) against Meta Platforms Ireland in 2023 is currently the largest fine.
- By annulling the fine, the Administrative Court relied on two decisions from the Court of Justice of the European Union in 2023, Deutsche Wohnen and Nacionalinis, which established a supervisory authority is obligated to demonstrate a deliberate act or negligence on the part of the personal data controller.
- It was held by the court that CNPD had failed to analyse the criterion of fault and had not verified an intentional violation of the GDPR by Amazon, or the company’s negligence.
International
Serbian Media and Justice Actors Step Up Co-operation to Strengthen Privacy Protection Online
- Serbian media and justice actors agreed to improve co-operation on privacy protection in Serbia’s digital media environment. This follows from a two-day Council of Europe event which focused on legal standards and practical responses to emerging privacy challenges.
- At the event, particular attention was devoted to the “right to be forgotten”, through the analysis of the Grand Chamber judgment of the European Court of Huan Rights in Hurbain v. Belgium (2023).
- Participants discussed the seven criteria developed by the Court for balancing freedom of expression and the right to respect for private life in digital press archives, including the nature of the archived information, the time elapsed since publication, the public interest in the information, the status of the person concerned, the consequences of continued online availability, the accessibility of the information in digital archives, and the impact of possible measures on freedom of expression.
- The second part of the event took the form of an inter-institutional dialogue, concluded with an agreed public initiative to strengthen co-operation among relevant actors in order to improve the protection of privacy in the media.
For the latest updates on the Reform UK data protection breach, US proposals on AI child safety and copyright, the Amazon GDPR fine ruling, and international privacy developments, visit our Data Protection News hub.
