THE IMPACT OF GDPR AND THE RELEVANCE OF BLOCKCHAIN

Jetse Sprey, CLO and co-founder of Europechain

It’s almost three years since GDPR came into effect in the EU. We talk to legal eagle Jetse Sprey in Amsterdam about the impacts of the law both within Europe and without.

What the main impacts?

Funnily enough the rules didn’t change that much from the rules that were in existence pre GDPR, but the key difference lies in the penalties attached to flaunting data protection rules.

This is a nutshell can explain why GDPR burst upon the world with such a vengeance three years, in some ways out of proportion to the new legalities. It fostered an awareness for companies who realised they needed to look after the data they held and to ensure they were GDPR compliant.

And not just here in Europe, anyone dealing with European people and their data also had to become compliant.

It’s been an earthquake.

At the same time, GDPR has become a sort of standard for international legislations, or rather an example to be followed. In California, the new data protection laws draw heavily on many of the elements of GDPR. The same can be said for new laws in India.

In this field of data protection, Europe is leading the way.