The General Law on the Protection of Personal Data (LGPD — Law 13.709, from 2018), which has until 2020 to come into force, was the subject of debate on Wednesday afternoon (6) in the Petrônio Portella Auditorium, in the Senate. With this deadline, in one year any company that wants to include information about its customers will need to follow procedures determined in the new legislation for the treatment of personal information or will suffer sanctions such as fines and blockages.
According to Márcio Coimbra, executive director of the Brazilian Legislative Institute (ILB) of the Senate, one of the promoters of the debate, the deadline, which extends until 2020, will serve to prepare and adapt the entry into force of the rule.
"This topic is essential in the context where the country will have to adapt to a new culture of personal data processing. Therefore, we need to understand the legal framework, know how the sector will be regulated, how the government will do it, how the private sector is experiencing this, what the main points discussed in the project were, what the correlation is with the outside world, with other countries, a comparative law parallel. In other words, we need to look at where Brazil will be in a year," Coimbra emphasized.
The LGPD (Brazilian General Data Protection Law) regulates the processing of personal data and information, including in digital media, by public and private entities. The law is inspired by regulations already used in Europe, with one important difference: in Brazil, public companies are also subject to the law. Companies that fail to comply with the requirements may face fines of up to R$ 50 million, among other sanctions.
Gilberto Lima, president of the Illuminante Institute for Technological Innovation and Social Impact—which promoted the debate in conjunction with the ILB—said that there could be no better place to hold the event, combining efforts to understand the impacts of this legislation and the responsibilities at each stage of data processing, from collection, storage, handling, distribution, and publication of this information. He recalled that education focused on this topic is something recent in Brazil, and the task of initiating these control changes is occurring at an opportune moment.
"The law comes at a more than opportune moment, in which there is a global movement of social networks, and life is increasingly digital. It is also extremely important to understand that the law is not punitive in nature. It aims to regulate and moralize the proper use of personal data, which is fundamental and necessary for the life of every citizen," Lima added.
Specialists
The debate was part of the "Innovation Tuesdays" event program. Among the guests, in addition to Coimbra and Lima, was the president of the Brazilian Association of Institutional and Governmental Relations (Abrig), Guilherme Cunha Costa, who opened the event.
The panel discussion consisted of José Ziebarth, representative of the Ministry of Economy for the area of debureaucratization and digitalization; Adriano Mendes, a legal expert specializing in digital law; and Ulysses Machado, advisor to the Federal Data Processing Service (Serpro).
Experts in the field also participated in the debate. Among them were Julien Dutra, Director of Institutional and Governmental Relations at Serasa Experian, a company with experience in compliance with the law in the United Kingdom; Jorge Pires, Director of the Portuguese company Datashield; and Ricardo Augusto Nascimento, partner at Visen Telecom, a company that handles data from telephone operators.
The debate was broadcast on TV Senado and can be accessed at [website address]. channel from the broadcaster on YouTube.
Source: The Senate Agency
