privacy breach – Cyber Law Watch

Long awaited increase to privacy breach penalties – a step closer to reality

Oct 26 2021

By Cameron Abbott, Rob Pulham, Max Evans and Ella Richards

On October 25 the Australian Attorney-General’s Department released a draft bill amending the Privacy Act 1988 (the Draft Bill), inviting industry submissions by 6 December 2021.

We have been hearing about an alignment with Australian consumer and competition law penalties for quite some time – and the Draft Bill does not disappoint.

Under the Draft Bill, the maximum penalties applicable to companies for serious or repeated privacy breaches will increase to the greater of:

$10 million
three times the value of any benefit obtained through the misuse of information, or
10% of the corporate group’s annual Australian turnover.

The Draft Bill also enables the introduction of an online privacy code, covering a wide scope of organisations to regulate social media services, large online platforms and data brokerage services. It is expected that industry will be given the first opportunity to develop the code, for approval by the Commissioner – with the ability for the Commissioner to develop the code in certain circumstances.

Finally, the Draft Bill introduces information sharing powers to facilitate greater engagement between the Information Commissioner and law enforcement bodies, alternative complaint bodies and State, Territory or foreign privacy regulators. This means the Information Commissioner or the receiving authority will be able to share information and documents to more effectively exercise their respective functions and powers.

With regulators banding together, maximum penalties becoming meaningful and a binding online privacy code on the horizon – there has never been a better time to get your Privacy house in order!

GDPR: Irish supervisory authority fines WhatsApp 225 million

Sep 07 2021

By Claude-Etienne Armingaud, Camille Scarparo and Léa Fertani.

Further to investigations initiated by the Data Protection Commission (or DPC, the Irish supervisory authority) in 2018, Whatsapp Ireland Limited has received a EUR 225 million fine on 2 September 2021. The company infringed multiple GDPR provisions including in relation with the information provided to data subjects which breached the obligation to ensure transparency of processing (Articles 13 and 14 GDPR).

Following GDPR’s one-stop-shop mechanism and as WhatsApp operates cross-border flows of personal data, the DPC had initially been designated as lead supervisory authority (‘LSA’). Article 60 GDPR requires the LSA to submit a draft decision to its impacted counterparts across the European Union (the ‘Concerned Supervisory Authorities’). Such draft has been submitted in December 2020 and the Hungarian, Portuguese, Italian, French, Dutch, Polish, German (local and federal) Concerned Supervisory Authorities unanimously raised objections to the DPC in January 2021. The objections mostly addressed the lax approach by the DPC in the assessment of WhatsApp’s breach of GDPR as well as the amount of the initially contemplated fine in view of the dozens of millions of individuals affected by such breach across the European Union.

This resulted in a non-consensual situation, escalading to the dispute resolution process under Article 65 GDPR conducted by the European Data Protection Board (EDPB). The binding decision, adopted on 28 July 2021 and subsequently notified to the DPC, required the Irish supervisory authority to reassess and increase the fine, thus leading to the second-highest fine under GDPR since its entry into force in 2018.

A Home Affair: Department of Home Affairs ordered to compensate Asylum Seekers following inadvertent disclosure

Feb 08 2021

By Cameron Abbott, Warwick Andersen, Michelle Aggromito and Max Evans

As a result of a recent class action, the Department of Home Affairs has been ordered by the Australian Information Commissioner, Angelene Falk, to pay compensation to asylum seekers after the Department was found to have interfered with the privacy of 9,251 detainees.

According to a media release from the Office of the Australian Information Commissioner (OAIC) , the relevant breach stemmed from February 2014, where the Department published on its website a “Detention Report”, which had embedded within it a Microsoft Excel spreadsheet containing the personal information (including full names, date of birth and period of immigration detention) of 9,258 individuals who were in immigration detention at that time.

Mar 16 2020

Cameron Abbott, Warwick Andersen and Max Evans

Following on from the consultation opened by the NSW Government in July 2019 (the subject of a previous blog), NSW Attorney-General Mark Speakman has committed to introducing a mandatory data breach scheme, according to an article by ITNews.

At present, neither NSW privacy laws nor the notifiable data breach scheme under Part IIIC of the Privacy Act 1988 (Cth) require public sector agencies in NSW to notify the NSW Privacy Commissioner and affected individuals where a data breach creates a risk of serious harm. This led to a consultation conducted by the Department of Communities and Justice in late 2019, which revealed “overwhelming public support” for the introduction of a mandatory data breach scheme in NSW, with the NSW Government “sharing a view” that the relevant scheme should be introduced.

PwC’s Enforcement Tracker finds a large increase in fines for privacy breaches in the UK

Jun 03 2019

By Cameron Abbott and Rebecca Gill

PwC’s UK Privacy & Security Enforcement Tracker has found that fines in the UK over data protection law violations totalled £6.5 million in 2018, a £2 million increase from 2017.

The Tracker analysed data protection enforcement actions by the UK Information Commissioner’s Office (ICO), including monetary fines, prosecutions and undertakings. The Tracker shows that the total sum of fines increased from 2017, but the number of ICO enforcements fell to 67 in 2018 from 91 in 2017.

Privacy Awareness Week (Online Privacy): credential stuffing attacks are on the rise in Australia

May 14 2019

By Cameron Abbott, Michelle Aggromito and Rebecca Gill

Today’s topic for Privacy Awareness Week is “online privacy”. It is no surprise that online privacy is a key topic of concern for businesses and consumers alike, given recent high-profile privacy breaches. Of particular significance is the issue of credential stuffing, as Australia is now the fifth highest target for credential stuffing attacks according to Akamai’s Credential Stuffing: Attacks and Economies report of April 2019 (Report).

Credential stuffing is a form of cyberattack where account credentials, usually usernames or email addresses and corresponding passwords, are stolen, typically from a previous security breach. The account credential combinations are then used to try and gain access to accounts at other sites via an automated and large-scale web application directed to multiple logins. It relies on individuals using the same password across multiple sites. K&L Gates has previously blogged on a high-profile credential stuffing attack that can be found here.

Facebook’s privacy breach puts spotlight on Australian election campaigns

Mar 28 2018

By Cameron Abbott and Georgia Mills

News of Facebook’s involvement in the United States’ elections is nothing new, especially with the ongoing Cambridge Analytica scandal, so it should come as little surprise that the social media giant has extended its reach into the Australian electoral sphere.

Facebook approached Australia’s major political parties during the 2016 Federal election offering a powerful data matching tool. This “advanced matching” tool would allow parties to match data they had collected about voters- including names, dates of birth, contact details, and postcodes- against similar information provided by users on their Facebook profiles. The combined data would allow parties to identify swinging voters and target them with tailored ads when they use Facebook.

Tag:privacy breach

Long awaited increase to privacy breach penalties – a step closer to reality

A Home Affair: Department of Home Affairs ordered to compensate Asylum Seekers following inadvertent disclosure

Uniformity of Law II: NSW Government pledges to introduce Mandatory Data Breach Reporting in respect to State Government Agencies

PwC’s Enforcement Tracker finds a large increase in fines for privacy breaches in the UK

Privacy Awareness Week (Online Privacy): credential stuffing attacks are on the rise in Australia

Facebook’s privacy breach puts spotlight on Australian election campaigns