Revised personal data protection bill proposes hefty fines, eases cross-border data flow

The Centre’s significantly shortened and revised draft Bill on personal data protection proposes a hefty increase in penalty amounts up to ₹500 crore, while also easing rules on cross-border data flows, in a big relief for large tech firms. The revised draft — now called The Digital Personal Data Protection Bill, 2022 — comes just over three months after its earlier avatar was withdrawn from Parliament by the Central government. The new draft Bill, on which stakeholder comments have been invited till December 17, also narrows down the scope of the data protection regime to personal data protection, leaving out non-personal data from its ambit — a move welcomed by the industry. “The Digital Personal Data Protection Bill, 2022, has been uploaded for public consultation today… We have made sure that all the principles of privacy which have been laid down by the Honourable Supreme Court in various judgements and basis the experience of various countries… We have included all principles…,” Minister of Electronics and Information Technology Ashwini Vaishnaw said.