Govt still studying need to amend Personal Data Protection Act

The government is holding discussions with the relevant agencies and parties regarding the need to amend the Personal Data Protection Act 2010 (Act 709), the Dewan Rakyat was told today.

Deputy Communications and Multimedia Minister Datuk Zahidi Zainul Abdin said the government would consider the views of various parties on personal data protection, as 15.1 million users had registered for the MySejahtera application.

“We have not brought this to the (Cabinet) meeting because we are in the discussion stage on the need to amend this act. Any decision after this will be left to the Cabinet,” he said during the question-and-answer session.

Zahidi was replying to a supplementary question from Gobind Singh Deo (PH-Puchong) on whether Act 709 is applicable to the federal government and on safety guarantees for personal data registered by individuals before entering premises.

To the original question from Gobind on the effectiveness of apps developed by the government in the wake of the COVID-19 pandemic, he said there were three such apps -- Gerak Malaysia, MySejahtera and MyTrace.

Zahidi said the cost of developing the three apps was fully borne by the industry.

On guarantees of personal data protection, Zahidi said the Personal Data Protection Department had on May 29 this year issued a procedure guide on the gathering, processing and storing of personal data by business premises during the Conditional Movement Control Order (CMCO).

“The guidelines include requiring business premises to record only the name, telephone number, and date and time of a visitor’s entry; there is a notice clearly stating the purpose of collecting the persoanl data and that the data can be kept up to six months after the end of the MCO,” he said.

Zahidi, who is the Padang Besar Member of Parliament, stressed that every business premises should permanently delete or destroy the personal data given by customers so that it would not be misused by irresponsible parties.

-- BERNAMA