Companies to get more help to comply with personal data regulations

 More assistance is on the way for firms in Singapore to comply with the Personal Data Protection Act (PDPA).

Authorities on Friday (May 8) introduced a few initiatives to help companies keep down compliance costs. These include legal consultation at preferential rates and indirect subsidies for firms to check against the “Do Not Call” (DNC) registry.

The DNC registry contains a list of mobile phone numbers of people who do not wish to be contacted for telemarketing purposes. Companies have to check against the registry before sending out messages to consumers, which incurs costs.

The costs can be defrayed with 500 credits given by the Personal Data Protection Commission (PDPC) annually, for companies to check against the registry. From Jun 1, this will be doubled to 1,000 credits yearly. One credit can be used to check against one number.

SOFTENING LEGAL COSTS

The Commission has also partnered the Law Society to implement a Legal Advice Scheme, available from June.

Under the scheme, small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) can have a one-hour consultation session with lawyers to check if they have complied with personal data regulations. The consultation comes at a fixed rate of S$500, which is typically lower than what companies will pay if they approached lawyers on their own.

In addition, the PDPC is issuing new advisory guidelines to provide organisations with greater clarity on what circumstances would consent from an individual be needed for marketing purposes. Under the guidelines, templates for obtaining and withdrawing consent will be provided for companies to adopt.