The Information Commissioners Office (ICO) has confirmed that it will hold businesses and organisations to account and will start publishing all reprimands issued, including retrospectively publishing all reprimands which have been issued since January 2022.
The ICO has a range of enforcement actions at its disposal, including information notices, enforcement notices, penalty notices and inspection powers. It has always published its enforcement notices, fines, and summaries of audit reports, but now it will be publishing those reprimands that it has issued.
It is well known that the level of fines for breaching data protection legislation has the potential to cripple a business, and whilst there is a spectrum of enforcement actions in the ICO’s armoury, publishing a company’s bad practices could also adversely affect its commerciality. Bad publicity could lead to consumers avoiding the business or organisation.
Personal data is becoming ever more valuable to businesses and organisations, and with consumers increasingly aware of the value of their data, it is important that they have trust in the brand. With recent studies indicating that consumers will provide more data if they trust those processing it, it is possible that bad publicity around a business’s privacy compliance could result in consumers taking their business elsewhere.
The ICO has indicated that it wants “organisations to put people at the heart of their practices by investing time and resources in ensuring their information is protected and used appropriately.”
To avoid the risk to your business’s reputation, it is important to ensure that your privacy framework is up to date, you are undertaking an ongoing risk assessment which feeds into the privacy frameworks, but are also telling consumers what personal data you process and how you are processing their personal data.
If you or your organisation have any queries on how to establish a data privacy culture, would like help with your privacy policies or to discuss your existing frameworks, please contact Eleanore Beard in our Data Protection team.
