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Content type: Advocacy
In our submission, we argue that the EDPB's opinion must take a firm approach to prevent peoples' rights being undermined by AI. We focus on the following issues in particular: The fundamentally general nature of AI models creates problems for the legitimate interest test;The risks of an overly permissive approach to the legitimate interests test;Web scraping as ‘invisible processing’ and the consequent need for transparency;Innovative technology and people’s fundamental rights;The (in)…
Content type: Examples
Uber has been fined €290 million in the Netherlands for sending European taxi drivers' data to the US without appropriate safeguards in violation of the EU's GDPR. The Dutch data protection authority, which adjudicated a complaint originally filed in France on behalf of more than 170 drivers there, says Uber has since stopped the practice. Uber contests this decision; the appeal is expected to take four years. Earlier in 2024, the authority also fined Uber €10 million for infringing privacy…
Content type: Advocacy
Generative AI models cannot rely on untested technology to uphold people's rightsThe development of generative AI has been dependent on secretive scraping and processing of publicly available data, including personal data. However, AI companies have to date had an unacceptably poor approach towards transparency and have sought to rely on unproven ways to fulfill people's rights, such as to access, rectify, and request deletion of their dataOur view is that the ICO should adopt a stronger…
Content type: Advocacy
In our submission we outline our concerns with the industry as a result of extensive technical research and complaints taken to data protection authorities in Europe as a result.
Data brokers must specifically be included in "actors in scope."
We recommend that "data brokers" are specifically included in the list of "actors in scope". A data broker is a company that collects, buys and sells personal data and this is often how they earn their primary revenue. It is a term that is entering…
Content type: Video
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Content type: Frequently Asked Questions
On 27 October 2020, the UK Information Commissioner's Office (ICO) issued a report into three credit reference agencies (CRAs) - Experian, Equifax and TransUnion - which also operate as data brokers for direct marketing purposes.
After our initial reaction, below we answer some of the main questions regarding this report.
Content type: News & Analysis
Privacy International (PI) welcomes today's report from the UK Information Commissioner's Office (ICO) into three credit reference agencies (CRAs) which also operate as data brokers for direct marketing purposes. As a result, the ICO has ordered the credit reference agency Experian to make fundamental changes to how it handles people's personal data within its offline direct marketing services.
It is a long overdue enforcement action against Experian.…
Content type: Examples
The algorithm and mathematical model used to predict students’ grades by the International Baccalaureate programme, which was forced to cancel exams because of the pandemic, incorporated three elements: coursework, teachers’ predictions of their students’ exam grades, and “school context”, which was based on historical teacher grade predictions (which universities use for provisional acceptances) and the school’s historical performance on each subject’s coursework. The result was to penalise…
Content type: News & Analysis
Back in June, we published our investigation into Facebook brands, highlighting how Facebook failed to provide its users with a fair and meaningful understanding of how targeted advertising operated on its platform, and a number of issues preventing users from exercising their rights to the fullest possible extent. In face of the serious gaps encountered, we published an open letter to Facebook drawing attention to four main issues as well as our recommended actions to tackle them. This letter…
Content type: News & Analysis
Banning TikTok? It's time to fix the out-of-control data exploitation industry - not a symptom of it
Chinese apps and tech companies have been at the forefront of the news recently. Following India's ban of 59 chinese apps in July, President Trump announced his desire to ban TikTok, shortly followed by his backing of Microsoft's intention to buy the US branch of its parent company ByteDance. Other than others lip syncing his public declaration, what does President Trump fear from this app, run by a firm, based in China?
It's all about that data
One clear answer emerges: the exploitation of…
Content type: Explainer
At first glance, infrared temperature checks would appear to provide much-needed reassurance for people concerned about their own health, as well as that of loved ones and colleagues, as the lockdown is lifted. More people are beginning to travel, and are re-entering offices, airports, and other contained public and private spaces. Thermal imaging cameras are presented as an effective way to detect if someone has one of the symptoms of the coronavirus - a temperature.
However, there is little…
Content type: Call to Action
Google wants to know everything about you.
It already holds a massive trove of data about you, but by announcing its plans to acquire the health and fitness tracker company Fitbit, it now clearly wants to get its hands on your health too. We don’t think any company should be allowed to accumulate this much intimate information about you. This is why we’re trying to stop its merger with Fitbit.
Google and Fitbit need the European Commission’s approval before they can merge. The merger would…
Content type: Frequently Asked Questions
The right to access your personal data (or access right) is just one of a number of data rights that may be found in data protection law, including the European Union's General Data Protection Regulation. Data Subject Access Requests, or DSARs, have helped us several times understand the extent of data companies and governments might hold on us, how this data might be shared among various recipients, or what other third parties a company might be using to obtain additional data and enrich their…
Content type: News & Analysis
GDPR was hard won. PI, together with other civil society actors, fought from the beginning for a version of the law that offers the strongest rights and protections in the face of intense industry lobbying.
Holding the hidden data ecosystem to account
Two years ago, we committed to using GDPR to seek to hold to account the hidden data ecosystem - those companies that amass and exploit large amounts of our data for profit.
Here’s some of the action we’ve taken:
In Nov 2018,…
Content type: Examples
Under the country's emergency laws, on May 4 the Hungarian government announced it would suspend parts of GDPR and exempted authorities from key provisions such as subject access rights, the right to request erasures, and providing notice that personal information is being collected and stored as long as the data is being collected under the rubric of coronavirus-related health protection.
The changes will remain in place until the government declares the end of the emergency. Opposition…
Content type: Examples
GDPRHub is collecting a list of projects around the world that are using personal data to combat the novel coronavirus. The list is divided into categories such as decentralised contact tracing apps and frameworks; centralised contact tracing systems; lockdown enforcement; self-assessment apps; mapping projects; and statistical analysis. The site also tracks COVID-19-releated data protection issues.
Source: https://gdprhub.eu/index.php?title=Projects_using_personal_data_to_combat_SARS-…
Content type: Examples
On March 20, the UK's Department of Health and Social Care published a notice providing legal backing for the NHS to set aside the duty of patient confidentiality as part of its response to the COVID-19 pandemic. As long as it is to fight the coronavirus, NHS organisations and GPs may share whatever patient data they deem necessary.
Source: https://twitter.com/halhod/status/1245297265054367744/photo/1
Writer: Hal Hodson
Publication: Twitter
Content type: Examples
On March 24 the German Bundestag passed a comprehensive amendment to the Infection Protection Act that authorises the Federal Ministry of Health to implement measures for medical care without the consent of the Federal Council. These include the ability to impose curfews and travel restrictions, override patent protection for medical products, and issue ordinances creating other exceptions to the law. The Federal Data Protection Commissioner criticised the proposals because he doubted whether…
Content type: Examples
The French telecom operator Orange is repurposing its 2013 Flux Vision, which allowed cities and tourist destinations to see their visitors' travel flows, to answer European Commissioner Thierry Breton's call for the EU's mobile operators to provide their location data to fight the pandemic through population monitoring. The French data protection regulator, CNIL, is suggesting that the data is anonymised and therefore legal to use. However, in order to provide the service Orange must first…
Content type: Examples
Led by Germany's Fraunhofer Heinrich Hertz Institute for Telecoms, technologists and scientists from at least eight countries, are working on a proximity-based contact tracing technology that complies with GDPR. The Pan-European Privacy-Preserving Proximity Tracing project (PEPP-PT) is intended to leverage smartphones to help disrupt the spread of infection by notifying individuals when their smartphones are near enough to to that of another person to carry out a Bluetooth handshake - thereby…
Content type: Examples
A review of European privacy laws considers whether the tracking and monitoring methods China used to shut down the COVID-19 epidemic are in compliance with GDPR. The French data protection authority CNIL says employers are not allowed to take mandatory temperature readings from employees or visitors or require them to fill out compulsory medical questionnaires. Italy passed emergency legislation requiring anyone who has recently stayed in an at-risk area to notify health authorities. Germany…
Content type: Long Read
A new study by Privacy International reveals how popular websites about depression in France, Germany and the UK share user data with advertisers, data brokers and large tech companies, while some depression test websites leak answers and test results with third parties. The findings raise serious concerns about compliance with European data protection and privacy laws.
This article is part of a research led by Privacy International on mental health websites and tracking. Read our…
Content type: Report
The full report of Privacy International's study on how popular websites about depression in France, Germany and the UK share user data with advertisers, data brokers and large tech companies, while some depression test websites leak answers and test results with third parties. The findings raise serious concerns about compliance with European data protection and privacy laws.
Content type: News & Analysis
This article is part of a research led by Privacy International on mental health websites and tracking. Read our full report.
According to the World Health Organisation (WHO), 25 percent of the European population suffers from depression or anxiety each year, yet about 50% of major depressions remain untreated. This means that everyday thousands of people are looking for information about depression online. They take tests to find out how serious their symptoms are, they try to access…
Content type: Examples
The Home Office Christmas 2018 announcement of the post-Brexit registration scheme for EU citizens resident in the UK included the note that the data applicants supplied might be shared with other public and private organisations "in the UK and overseas". Basing the refusal on Section 31 of the Freedom of Information Act, the Home Office refused to answer The3Million's FOI request for the identity of those organisations. A clause in the Data Protection Act 2018 exempts the Home Office from…
Content type: News & Analysis
While people may think that providing their photos and data is a small price to pay for the entertainment FaceApp offers, the app raises concerns about privacy, manipulation, and data exploitation—although these concerns are not necessarily unique to FaceApp.According to FaceApp's terms of use and privacy policy, people are giving FaceApp "a perpetual, irrevocable, nonexclusive, royalty-free, worldwide, fully-paid, transferable sub-licensable license" to use or publish the…
Content type: Advocacy
In early June 2019, PI engaged in the UK's Centre for Data Ethics and Innovation consultation regarding online targeting. PI focused its submission on the use of targeting in online political and issue-based advertising, and the collection and use of data to target people online.
In considering the impact of online targeting, it is essential that the Centre for Data Ethics and Innovation have due regard for privacy as a fundamental right (as enshrined in UK, European, and International Law).…
Content type: Long Read
Like millions of other people, you use messaging apps, social media, share, read and watch content on your phone or computer. If that’s the case then hundreds of AdTech companies collect and exchange your data every single day. AdTech, a short form of advertisement technology, is a catch-all term that describes tools and services that connect advertisers with target audiences and publishers. It’s also a multi-billion-dollar industry that is facing investigations by Data Protection Authorities…
Content type: Examples
In November 2018, a report by the consultancy Privacy Company, on behalf of the Dutch Ministry of Justice, found that Microsoft could be breaking European data collection rules because its Office software was collecting large amounts of personal data including email subject lines and snippets of content typed into emails or Word. The data was originally transmitted to the US, but in an effort to comply with GDPR Microsoft had switched to storing the data in Europe. The Dutch government was…
Content type: Press release
The Irish Data Protection Commission has today launched an inquiry into the data practices of ad-tech company Quantcast, a major player in the online tracking industry. PI's 2018 investigation and subsequent submission to the Irish DPC showed how the company is systematically collecting and exploiting people's data in ways people are unaware of. PI also investigated and complained about Acxiom, Criteo, Experian, Equifax, Oracle, and Tapad.
PI welcomes this announcement and its focus on…