Ireland reported 6,716 personal data breaches last year to the Data Protection Commission, new figures reveal today.
This means the country ranks second for the highest number of notifications per capita across Europe.
More than 160,000 data breaches have been reported across the 28 EU member states plus Norway, Iceland and Liechtenstein since the GDPR came into force on May 25, 2018.
Ireland reported 132.52 per 100,000 people between January of last year and this month.
This puts it just behind The Netherlands, which had 147.2 reported breaches per 100,000 people. Italy, Romania and Greece reported the fewest number of breaches per capita, according to global law firm DLA Piper’s latest GDPR Data Breach Survey.
The firm’s John Magee said Ireland plays an important role in data protection, as so many “data-rich” businesses are based here.
He added: “GDPR has driven the issue of data breach well and truly into the open.
“The rate of breach notification has increased by over 12% compared to last year’s report and it is no surprise to see Ireland — a strategic global hub for data-rich businesses across many sectors — once again ranked highly on number of breach notifications.”
But Mr Magee expects the cost of fines for countries to increase over the next few years.
He said: “We expect to see momentum build with more multi-million euro fines being imposed over the coming year as regulators ramp up their enforcement activity.”
The daily rate of breach notifications has also increased by 12.6% from 247 notifications across the EU per day for the first eight months of GDPR from May 25, 2018, to January 27, 2019, to 278 notifications per day for the current year.
GDPR is being enforced through fines for countries that breach the law, and are imposed by national data protection regulators.
The personal data breaches reported to the Irish Data Protection Commission include instances of unauthorised or accidental disclosures of personal information, cyber incidents or hacks and lost devices.
