Sections of POPI relating to information regulator effective
Certain sections of the Protection of Personal Information (POPI) Act, which deal with the establishment of the information regulator, the procedure for making regulations and the nature of regulations that may be set by the regulator, came into effect on Friday, professional services firm KPMG said on Monday.
The Act aimed to give effect to the constitutional right to privacy of consumers by introducing measures to ensure that organisations processed personal information “in a fair, responsible and secure manner”.
The legislation encompassed why and how these firms collected, used, disclosed and stored personal information belonging to natural and juristic persons.
KPMG privacy team head Graham Teare said in a statement that he had observed a global trend towards improved privacy protection enforcement, with increased cases of significant regulatory fines in the cases of noncompliance.
“All companies that process personal information are required to comply with POPI. Noncompliance has serious consequences, such as fines, prison terms and, most significantly, reputational risk.
“Organisations should not underestimate the potentially negative effect of noncompliance on [a] company’s reputation. The consequences of a tarnished reputation, including a loss of trust in the organisation, could far exceed the effects of a fine,” he commented.
KPMG legal privacy specialist Nikki Pennel added that, while most companies had privacy standards and processes in place, organisations should conduct an analysis identifying gaps in their current state of privacy-readiness for compliance with POPI.
“Critical to the gap analysis is identifying practical strategies which can be implemented easily and are aligned to the operations of business,” she noted.
Teare, meanwhile, suggested that POPI should be considered from a number of perspectives, including legal, business processes, systems and overall governance.
He said compliance with POPI, which was gazetted in December, was “challenging”.
“Companies, therefore, need to ensure that their current processes, employees, contractors and systems can handle the potential demands that POPI could place on them.
“The Act should not be viewed in isolation. It provides a broad framework, but must work in conjunction with other industry-specific legislation, which touches, to some extent, on data protection,” said Teare.
He explained that POPI required a dedicated team of specialists with a full complement of privacy experts to assist clients to navigate the new legislation.
“An effective POPI team should comprise specialists from corporate law, information technology, regulatory compliance and forensics. The POPI solution will have to be commercially focused, client-centric and practical,” Teare advised.
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