Category News

September 5, 2015,  Events, News  No comments

The Queen is expected to make a rare public speech thanking her British and Commonwealth subjects for 63 years of support when she becomes our longest-reigning monarch on Wednesday.

Her Majesty, who had originally wanted to spend the landmark day in private, has already bowed to the clamour for a public appearance by agreeing to interrupt her holiday at Balmoral and open a railway in the Borders.

Now she is said to be contemplating going even further by speaking at the end of her journey aboard a steam train, when she would be likely to pay tribute to her great-great-grandmother Queen Victoria, the woman whose record reign she will overtake.

Queen Victoria’s reign of...

July 29, 2015,  Council of Ministers, EU General Data Protection Regulation, European Commission, European Data Protection Supervisor, European Parliament, News  No comments

This week the EU’s independent privacy watchdog, the European Data Protection Supervisor (EDPS) has declared wide ranging support for the European Parliament’s version of the EU General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) that’s the subject of trilogue negotiations between the European Commission, European Parliament and Council that may be concluded as early as end of October 2015.

However, a notable difference between the EDPS and the European Parliament’s view is the mandatory appointment by organisations and companies of a Data Protection Officer (DPO).

It’s worth noting that 35% of all EU Member States currently require the appointment of a DPO as a compulsory measur...

July 26, 2015,  Council of Ministers, data protection, EU General Data Protection Regulation, European Commission, European Parliament, News  No comments

For Working Party 29 (WP29), the role of the Data Protection Officer (DPO) under the forthcoming EU General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) is the cornerstone of accountability as well as being a real tool of competitiveness for companies.

Tasked with the implementation of accountability tools that include the policies, procedures documentation, data protection impact assessments as well as internal training for all employees entrusted with handling customer data, the DPO is more like a ‘compliance orchestrator’ in much the same way as a conductor of a symphony orchestra, such as Parsee-born Zubin Mehta, conductor of the Israeli Philharmonic Orchestra.

In its advice not...

June 15, 2015,  Council of Ministers, EU General Data Protection Regulation, European Parliament, Legal update, News  No comments

Speaking at a news conference a few hours ago, Věra Jourová, the European Union’s Commissioner for Justice, Consumers and Gender Equality announced that an “historic step” had been taken today as the European Council of Ministers reached agreement on the general approach on the General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR).

Latvia’s minister for justice Dzintars Rasnačs added: “We have moved a great step closer to modernised and harmonised data protection framework for the European Union...

March 1, 2015,  EU General Data Protection Regulation, News  No comments

Guenther Oettinger, Europe’s digital economy chief and the German representative on the European Commission has delivered a stark warning to Google and Facebook that they must either comply with the principles of the forthcoming EU General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) or face being thrown out of the single market.

Oettinger accused the tech giants of using “an electronic vacuum cleaner” to collect and then target advertising using detailed information of users often without their knowledge or consent.

Speaking to the Wall Street Journal, Oettinger said: “The Americans are in the lead, they’ve got the data, the business models and so the power.”

He predicted t...

February 28, 2015,  data protection, EU General Data Protection Regulation, Legal update, Marketing practice, News, Social marketing practice  No comments

We have two feature articles written by Ardi Kolah:

Data protection rules overhaul – Top Tips for compliance

Extract: Data protection and the security of data is perhaps the biggest issue facing the advertising and marketing sector from a business continuity perspective as to get this badly wrong opens the door to punitive fines of up to five per cent of global turnover or €100m. Ardi Kolah shares his top ten tips for marketers.

Urgent Action is Required as Data Breaches hit Record Highs

Extract: According to global digital security firm Gemalto, 1,541 data breaches in 2014 led to one billion data records being compromised, representing a four per cent increase in data...

February 14, 2015,  Council of Ministers, data protection, EU General Data Protection Regulation, European Commission, European Parliament, News  No comments

The Presidency of the EU Council is in the hands of the Latvians until June and urged on by European Commission they’ve highlighted data protection reform across Europe as a key priority. Data protection reform may not grab national news headlines here in the UK but the consequences of what will become law across all 28 EU Member States will have far reaching implications for the Government put in charge of running the country after the British General Election is decided in May 2015.

As discussed in blogs on this and many other websites, the spate of data breaches and the security implications for millions of European citizens continues to grow bigger on a daily basis.

And...

January 31, 2015,  Guru in a Bottle, News  No comments

Photograph by David Graeme-Baker

Earlier this week, the Worshipful Company of Marketors, the livery company representing the interests of marketing professionals in the City and the Financial Services Forum held a joint seminar on the subject of the EU General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) at Cass Business School, London. This was the first time that both organisations had collaborated on an issue that impacts the financial services sector more than any other sector.

Those taking part (left to right) were Martin Hickley, data governance, protection and privacy expert; Hazel Grant, partner and head of privacy and information law at Fieldfisher; Ardi Kolah, director of Go...

January 14, 2015,  News  No comments

Over the next 24 hours all eyes will be on US President Barak Obama as he plays host to the British PM David Cameron at the White House.

And whilst Anglo-American relations are warm and friendly, Obama’s body language will reveal his pan-European tendencies when it comes to security and data protection.

This is in sharp contrast to the reticence of David Cameron to an intra-country solution as advocated by European Commission President Jean-Claude Juncke who’s determined to fast-track the EU General Data Protection Regulation this year.

David Cameron and Barak Obama have a working dinner tomorrow night and will meet in the Oval Office on Friday...

January 10, 2015,  News, Social marketing practice  No comments

Impatience with the progress of the forthcoming EU General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) is starting to grow within the European Union.

A recent joint declaration adopted by representatives of the German, Austrian, Belgian, Croatian, French, Greek, Hungarian, Lithuanian, Luxembourg, Dutch, Portuguese, Czech, Romanian, UK, Slovakian and Swedish  parliaments called on European legislators to adopt the GDPR “by 2015”.

German Green MEP Jan Philipp Albrecht, vice chairman of the civil liberties committee at the European Parliament warned this week that failure to agree on the new security and data protection rules was “bad for democracy” as this left European citizens exposed...