On August 15, Philippine President Benigno Aquino III signed into law the Data Privacy Act of 2012, formally titled “An Act Protecting Individual Personal Information in Information and Communications Systems in the Government and the Private Sector, Creating for this Purpose a National Privacy Commission, and for Other Purposes”. The Act is modeled after the EU Data Protection Directive and the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) Privacy Framework.The Act applies to “the processing of all types of personal information” and to any person, including both government and private-sector entities, “involved in personal information processing including those personal information controllers and processors who, although not found or established in the Philippines, use equipment that are located in the Philippines, or those who maintain an office, branch or agency in the Philippines.” The Act contains provisions that govern the processing of personal information, the rights of data, and the security of personal information and sets forth a detailed schedule of penalties for violations of the Act, which include both imprisonment and fines.
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