FG Earns N13.65m From Data Protection Fine, Report Filing
The Federal government has earned the sum of N13.65m from the data protection activities involving licensing, audit report filing and fine, according to the Nigeria Data Protection Regulation Performance report.
As contained in the report published by the National Information Technology Development Agency on Friday, Data Protection Compliance Organisations paid a total of N12.65m into the coffers of the government for licensing and filing of audit reports.
The report stated that an additional N1m was paid by the Lagos Internal Revenue Service as fine for exposing the data of some taxpayers, thereby breaching the provision of the NDPR.
NITDA said the decision on the fine value was reached after considering the cooperation and prompt remedial actions taken by the LIRS in the course of the investigation.
“NITDA served 51 enforcement notices on data controllers who are perceived to have breached the provisions of the NDPR. Also, 180 compliance notices were served on Ministries, Departments and Agencies of government, one of which is the Lagos Internal Revenue Service breach,” the report stated
It added, “The LIRS was found to have exposed the personal data of some taxpayers in the process of harmonising historical tax data. NITDA initiated an investigation on LIRS and its major data processor. A fine of N1m (over $2,500) was imposed on the LIRS.”
The agency said receipts from audit implementation by DPCOs showed that over N2.3m had been earned in one year while 2,686 jobs roles had been created.
According to NITDA, the data protection service market is expected to gross $100m by 2023.
Between 2019 and 2020, the report stated that 70 DPCO had been licensed and that they had filed 635 audit reports, which revealed the data handling processes of organisations.
NITDA said it was currently reviewing filed audit reports but preliminary evaluation indicated that data controlling and processing entities needed to improve on their systems and processes.
In his keynote address at the presentation of the report, the Minister of Communications, Dr Isa Pantami, noted that the integrity of the economy relied to a large extent on the integrity and protection of data.
According to him, the NDPR aligned perfectly with the country’s National Digital Economy Policy and Strategy.
