- The International Data Corporation forecasts that by 2025 the total number of connected IoT devices alone will reach 41.6 billion and generate 79.4ZB of data.
- Having realised the importance of regulating the storage and flow of data within their own countries and across borders, the governments in the APAC region have created national data privacy frameworks that ensures the protection of citizen’s private data.
- The complexity of data protection has encouraged countries within the APAC region to seek out bilateral and multilateral collaborations on digital governance and privacy.
The Digital Governance Report by the swissnex Network is a combined study on some of the pressing technology and governance challenges in the APAC region, and the innovative solutions being adopted by its public and private sectors.
In the digital era, the creation, aggregation and exchange of data worldwide has been exponential. The International Data Corporation forecasts that by 2025 the total number of connected IoT devices alone will reach 41.6 billion and generate 79.4ZB of data. The APAC region is expected to become the enterprise data powerhouse of the world, according to a study by Digital Realty’s 2020 Data Gravity Index. This is primarily driven by the growth of technology led companies in the top cities of this region.
Having realised the importance of regulating the storage and flow of data within their own countries and across borders, the governments in the APAC region have created national data privacy frameworks that ensures the protection of citizen’s private data, while allowing data transfer across borders to enable trade and commerce. However, these regulations are by and large fragmented in nature and require closer scrutiny.
Australia, Japan, Korea and Singapore have laid down comprehensive policy frameworks for data protection (with Japan and Korea having put in place some of the most advanced frameworks in the world). India and China are soon to follow suit. However, the large amount of data generated has led some authorities to view it as a national resource, and thereby, create regulations driven by political motivations. It has also placed private companies in an influential position as they are the primary agents who collect, process and analyse this data. Hence, governments and private organisations are the primary custodians of data and the deciding authorities on their relevance and use. This has, in turn, transformed the nature of the relationship between the state and the individual.
Countries like India and China have made it mandatory for international companies to store data on local servers, while restricting data transfer across borders if it is likely to impact national security or public interest. However, the authorities have exempted themselves from this requirement if it benefits them to access business intelligence and intellectual property of companies for its own ‘planning’ and ‘development’ purposes.
Each country within the APAC region has developed a different model based on its own unique cultural and other considerations, thereby creating convoluted regulations that hinder as much as enable international collaboration of digital economies.
The complexity of data protection has encouraged countries within the APAC region to seek out bilateral and multilateral collaborations on digital governance and privacy. These discussions have led to the establishment of frameworks such as the Asia-Pacific Telecommunity (APT) in 1979 or the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) Cross-Border Privacy Rules (CBPR) System. The core purpose of these initiatives is to find optimal solutions for strengthening data security and privacy laws.
To know more about the complexities of data privacy regulations in the APAC region and their economic and societal implications, read our full report.
NO COMMENT