On 29 November 2024, the Australian Senate passed the Privacy and Other Legislation Amendment Bill 2024 (Cth) (the Privacy Act Bill).  This follows the passage of the Cyber Security Act 2024 (Cth), and other cyber-security related amendments, on 25 November 2024.  

The majority of the amendments to the Privacy Act 1988 (Cth) will

Continue Reading Australia: Privacy Act amendments and Cyber Security Act become law

It’s the turn of South-East Asian countries to update their data protection laws. Here is our summary of the proposed new data protection laws in Vietnam, Malaysia and Indonesia. Organisations are advised to update their data protection compliance programmes as soon as possible to reflect these developments.

Vietnam

Vietnam issued its first draft of a

Continue Reading VIETNAM, MALAYSIA AND INDONESIA: what you need to know about the new SE Asia data protection laws

Planning and developing an effective communications strategy is a critical step in preparing for a cyber security incident. Last week, the UK’s National Cyber Security Centre published guidance on communicating with stakeholders before, during and after a cyber security incident. The guidance is published with organisations of all sizes in mind, and sets out three

Continue Reading UK: NCSC issue guidance on how to communicate effectively in a cyber incident

Today marks the deadline for EU Member State implementation of the Network and Information Systems Directive II (“NIS2“) into national law.

NIS2 is part of the EU’s Cybersecurity Strategy and repeals and replaces the original NIS Directive which entered into force in 2016 (with Member State implementation by 9 May 2018). Much like

Continue Reading EU: NIS2 Member State implementation deadline has arrived

Additional and clarified data compliance obligations will soon come into force under the long-awaited Network Data Security Management Regulation (“Regulation“), which was released on 30 September 2024. The Regulation is formulated under the existing data protection framework pillars of the Cyber Security Law, the Data Security Law and the Personal Information Protection Law

Continue Reading CHINA: Enhanced and clarified data compliance obligations on handlers of “network data”, covering personal information and important data, and operators of online platforms from 1 January 2025

It has been a busy month for cyber and privacy regulation in Australia. On the heels of the proposed amendments to the Privacy Act 1988 released just under a month ago (see our summary here), three further draft Bills relating to cyber security were released this week.

The key takeaways from the new Bills

Continue Reading Australia’s Cyber Security Strategy in action – three new draft laws published

In the much anticipated first King’s Speech of the new Labour Government on 17 July 2024, the monarch announced that the long anticipated Cybersecurity and Resilience Bill (CS&R Bill) would be amongst those new laws making their way onto Parliament’s schedule for the next year. Six years on from the implementation of the 

Continue Reading UK: The UK Cybersecurity and Resilience Bill – a different approach to NIS2 or a British sister act?

Cyber regulation is changing in Australia. As governments globally grapple with the everchanging and increasingly challenging cyber landscape, Australia is poised to implement new laws and update existing regulation in order to enhance Australia’s cyber security and resilience. These changes fall within the framework established by the 2023-2030 Australian Cyber Security Strategy, which aims to

Continue Reading Australia: Anti-scam measures and ransomware reporting on the agenda

Hong Kong is following other jurisdictions, including Mainland China, Singapore and the UK, in proposing to enhance cybersecurity obligations on IT systems of those operating critical infrastructure (“CI“). While the proposed new law, tentatively entitled the Protection of Critical Infrastructure (Computer System) Bill (the“proposed legislation”), is still at an early stage

Continue Reading Hong Kong: A Practical Guide to the Proposed Critical Infrastructure Cybersecurity Legislation

The Federal Trade Commission (FTC) reiterated its long-held view that hashing or pseudonymizing identifiers does not render data anonymous, in a post to its Technology Blog on July 24, 2024.

In the rather strongly worded post, while acknowledging that hashing and pseudonymizing data has the benefit of obscuring the underlying personal data, the FTC

Continue Reading FTC Reiterates that Hashed and Pseudonymized Data is Still Identifiable Data