Foro de Habeas Data

Data Protection in Latin America

See http://www.dataprotectionlaws.com.ar/

and also Foro de Habeas Data and Law of Habeas Data

Para mas información sobre Habeas Data y Protección de datos personales Ver Foro de Habeas Data. El sitio www.habeasdata.org no tiene relación alguna con este blog.

Pablo Palazzi

First Spam decision in Latin America

First Spam decision in Latin America

On April 7, 2006 a federal judge from the City of Buenos Aires (Argentina) issued the first decision in a spam case. Plaintiffs Gustavo Daniel Tanus and Pablo Andres Palazzi sued a well known spammer under the new data protection law of Argentina.

In their complaint the two plaintiffs argued that section 27 of the 2000 Argentine Data Protection Law gives them a right to opt out, which the spammer did not comply with when they asked to be removed from the database (They demanded that their email be deleted from the database).

In November 2003, the judge issued an injunction, declaring that during the process the defendant should refrain from sending plaintiffs additional e-mails. The injunction also forbade the transfer of the plaintiffs emails to third parties. His decision was based on the data protection law, section 1, 2, 5, 11 and 27.

This month the judge issued the final decision, ordering the defendants to stop dealing with, in any way, the personal data of the plaintiffs and delete their personal information. The decision asserted (confirmed?) that the sending of spam infringed the plaintiff´s privacy and data protection rights.

Spam is starting to be regulated throughout Latin America. Recently, bills were introduced in Congress in Brazil, Argentina and Chile,and there is already a special law in Peru. Brazil also has an open relays black list project, and there are web sites and non for profit movement in Argentina (Rompecadenas, Spambusters and iCAUCE Argentina) and Brazil (see http://www.antispam.org.br/).