The government on Friday released the draft of a new comprehensive data protection bill for public view, months after withdrawing a previous bill. India had in early August withdrawn the personal data protection bill. The much-debated bill introduced in 2019 had alarmed big tech firms such as Google and Facebook parent Meta.
A key point of the revised draft is a penalty of Rs 250 crore if the personal safety of users is compromised.
" Seeking your views on draft Digital Personal Data Protection Bill, 2022," Electronics and Information Technology Minister Ashwini Vaishnaw made the announcement in a tweet.
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To recall, after withdrawing the previous data protection bill in August, the Centre said that it would devise a fresh set of regulations that will be a better fit for the comprehensive legal framework. The Personal Data Protection Bill was slammed by privacy experts. It was deemed to be more beneficial to central agencies as the bill would allow them to freely obtain data under certain conditions.
According to non-profit Internet Freedom Foundation (IFF), the Data Protection Bill 2021 gave large exemptions to government departments, prioritises the interests of big corporations, and did not adequately respect people's fundamental right to privacy.
"This move, when taken with the lack of literacy around data protection in India, may be dangerous on an individual level -- where your everyday privacy is threatened -- and on a collective level, given how it makes allowances for mass surveillance," IFF had alleged.
Also, big tech firms such as Amazon, Google, and Meta raised objections to some of the bill’s provisions that would mandate local storage of data and also the processing of some sensitive information within the country. It also looked to provide exemptions to the government’s own probe agencies from the Act’s provisions, which saw a huge uproar from the opposition.
Around a dozen of industry bodies had written to Vaishnaw that implementation of the proposed Data Protection Bill, as recommended by a parliamentary panel, will significantly degrade India's business environment and reduce foreign investment inflows.