On October 3, the Chamber hosted the conference “GDPR Compliance for Latin American companies: challenges and opportunities”, organised in collaboration with the member company VGA Law.

The speaker, Laura Van Gompel, a lawyer in Mexican and Belgian law specialising in data protection and contract law, reviewed during the conference the main differences and similarities between the data protection laws of Latin American countries such as Colombia, Mexico, Peru, Argentina and Venezuela and the European GDPR.

In addition, she exemplified the various casuistries through the analysis of legal-practical cases related to issues such as data protection in roadside assistance, in textile production plants and in the use of drones.

For each case study, Laura Van Gompel gave a brief overview of the legal framework to be applied in each country and reviewed the complex issues that data protection legislation poses for companies from Latin American countries operating in Europe or cooperating with European companies.

According to Van Gompel, the advance of information technologies and the management of increasingly large databases has in recent decades raised several dilemmas regarding the use of sensitive personal and business data that are still being regulated, with the added difficulty that not all countries are legislating at the same pace and in the same direction.