Data Privacy
Data privacy refers to the rights and controls individuals have over how their personal information is collected, used, stored, shared, and deleted by businesses and organizations.
“Data Privacy focuses on who can access personal data and how it is used.
Data Protection refers to the technical and organizational methods used to secure data against unauthorized access, breaches, or loss.
Together, they ensure personal data is used responsibly and securely.”
The Digital Personal Data Protection Act is India’s data protection law designed to regulate how personal data is collected, stored, processed, and shared. It gives individuals rights over their data and imposes responsibilities on organizations (data fiduciaries and processors) to handle data lawfully and transparently.
Data Fiduciaries can be liable for fines of up to ₹250 crore, depending on the violation, including failure to implement security safeguards, breach of consent, or non-compliance with regulatory directions. Data Principals can be fined up to ₹10,000 if they provide false or misleading information or misuse personal data rights, such as submitting fraudulent requests.
Users have the right to:
- Access information about what personal data is being processed and for what purpose
- Correction and updating of inaccurate or incomplete data
- Erasure of personal data when it is no longer necessary, or consent is withdrawn
- Withdraw consent at any time
- Grievance redressal through the data fiduciary’s mechanism
- Nominate another person to exercise their rights in case of death or incapacity
Data Fiduciary is any person (including an individual, company, or other entity) who alone or in conjunction with other Persons determines the purpose and means of processing of Personal Data.
A Significant Data Fiduciary (SDF) is a Data Fiduciary notified by the Government of India based on factors such as the volume and sensitivity of the data processed, the risk to individuals, and the impact on national interests.
“Data Principal” refers to the individual whose personal data is being collected, processed, or stored.
Any person (including an individual, company, or other entity) who processes Personal Data on behalf of a data fiduciary.
Yes, the DPDP Act applies to all Data Fiduciaries, including educational institutions.
DPDP Act provides exemption to educational institutions for only Section 9 Clause 1 of the Act (Parental Consent for Child/Person with Disability) and Section 9 Clause 3 of the Act (Behavioral monitoring of children and targeted advertising directed to children).
Both exemptions are subject to the activities being performed solely for educational purposes and in the interest of the safety of enrolled children.
Except for these limited exemptions, Educational Institutions have to comply with all rules and requirements of the DPDP Act.
Yes, the DPDP Act applies to all Data Fiduciaries, including startups and small businesses.
Yes. The DPDP Act allows the transfer of personal data outside India unless the Central Government restricts transfers to specific countries.
Data discovery is the process of identifying where personal and sensitive data resides across an organization’s digital environment – including structured and unstructured repositories — so it can be managed and protected appropriately.
Data discovery gives visibility into where personal and sensitive data exists. Without it, organizations cannot accurately assess compliance risk, protect data effectively, or respond to privacy requests.
Data classification is the activity of labeling data based on its sensitivity, compliance requirements, and business value so organizations can enforce the correct privacy and security policies.
Classified data helps prioritize protection: sensitive, regulated, or high-risk data gets stronger controls than less critical information, aligning privacy and security efforts to business risk.
Visual markers automatically label and watermark sensitive documents (headers/footers) to indicate sensitivity levels, helping ensure correct handling and access control.
Seqrite Data Privacy offers connectors for 500+ data sources including databases, SaaS applications, cloud storage, file servers, and collaboration platforms. Custom connectors can also be developed if needed
Cookie consent is the user’s permission for a website or app to store and access cookies or similar tracking technologies on their device. It ensures transparency and gives users control over how their data (such as preferences, behavior, or analytics data) is collected and used. While India’s DPDP Act does not explicitly mention cookies, consent is required if cookies collect personal data.
Consent management is the practice of obtaining, recording, and managing user permissions (consent) before collecting or processing their personal data. It ensures compliance with privacy laws and gives users control over their personal information.
A Consent Manager is typically a role (or tool/system) responsible for handling the lifecycle of user consent — from capture to tracking, audit, modification, and revocation — in accordance with India’s DPDP Act and other privacy laws.
Under India’s DPDP Act, a Consent Manager is a registered entity responsible for enabling Data Principals to give, manage, review, and withdraw their consent through an interoperable and transparent platform, as prescribed by the Act and its rules.
A Consent Management Solution, in contrast, is a technology platform used by organizations (Data Fiduciaries) to operationalize consent internally – by capturing consent, mapping it to purposes, enforcing consent choices, maintaining audit trails, and ensuring compliance with DPDP requirements.
In essence, a Consent Manager acts as a trusted, user-facing intermediary defined by the DPDP framework, while a Consent Management Solution helps organizations implement and manage consent obligations within their systems.
Yes , Seqrite Data Privacy offers centralized consent and preference management so you can collect, update, track, and honor consent changes in real time with complete audit trails.
Under the DPDP Act, organizations must inform the Data Protection Board without undue delay after discovering a breach, and submit a detailed report within 72 hours, including affected data, impact, and remedial measures.
It provides breach logging with automated alerts and customizable notification templates to inform stakeholders quickly and align with regulatory requirements.
A PIA is a structured evaluation to identify data privacy risks in business processes and systems and determine how to reduce those risks.
Vendor risk management is evaluating and monitoring third-party partners for privacy and security compliance to ensure they protect personal data appropriately.
The platform includes predefined assessment templates (DPIA, RoPA, privacy gap assessments, third-party risk) and supports guidance frameworks like NIST Privacy and GDPR checklists to streamline evaluations.
Automation reduces manual workload, ensures consistent enforcement of privacy policies, generates audit trails, and helps respond rapidly to regulatory changes and user requests.
Seqrite Data Privacy helps DPOs and compliance teams by providing centralized visibility into personal data, automating data discovery and classification, managing user consent and preferences, handling rights requests, supporting privacy assessments, and enabling audit-ready reporting — all from a single platform.
Seqrite Data Privacy automates rights requests using case workflows that let you search, locate, act upon, and track requests such as access, rectification, or deletion — all with audit logs for compliance enforcement.
Yes. Seqrite Data Privacy offers modular licensing, enabling organizations to begin with essential modules (e.g., Data Discovery & Classification) and scale up as their privacy program needs evolve.
Seqrite Data Privacy supports both cloud & on-premise hybrid deployments, allowing you to choose the model that fits your data governance and compliance requirements.
Yes – it can share discovery and classification outputs with DLP systems and expose insights to strengthen data protection workflows while maintaining existing investments.
While designed with the DPDP Act in mind, the platform is configurable for global requirements like GDPR, CCPA, PDPL, HIPAA, and others, supporting flexible policy and workflow adjustments.
By providing transparent consent management, clear data handling practices, and adherence to privacy laws, it strengthens customer trust and drives transparency.
The Digital Personal Data Protection (DPDP) Act, 2023 is India’s comprehensive data protection law that regulates how organizations collect, store, process, and share personal data of Indian citizens. It applies to all Data Fiduciaries including private companies, startups, educational institutions, and government bodies that process digital personal data, regardless of their size or industry. Non-compliance can result in fines of up to ₹250 crore for serious violations.
Under the DPDP Act, Data Fiduciaries can face financial penalties of up to ₹250 crore per violation, with specific penalty amounts based on the nature of the breach such as failure to implement adequate security safeguards, non-compliance with Data Board directions, or violations of children’s data protection rules. Data Principals (individuals) can also be fined up to ₹10,000 for submitting false or fraudulent data rights requests. These significant penalties make proactive DPDP compliance essential for Indian organizations.
Under the DPDP Act, Indian citizens have the right to: (1) access information about what personal data is being processed and for what purpose; (2) correction and updating of inaccurate data; (3) erasure of personal data when it is no longer needed; (4) withdraw consent at any time; (5) grievance redressal through the organization’s mechanisms; and (6) nominate another person to exercise their rights in case of death or incapacity. Organizations must have processes in place to honor these rights within defined timelines.
A Data Fiduciary is any entity company, organization, or individual that determines the purpose and means of processing personal data. Under the DPDP Act, Data Fiduciaries must: obtain valid consent before processing personal data, implement reasonable security safeguards, notify the Data Protection Board and affected individuals in case of a breach within 72 hours, honor data principal rights requests, and ensure that any Data Processors they engage also comply with data protection obligations.
Seqrite Data Privacy provides a unified platform for DPDP compliance that includes: automated data discovery across 500+ data sources, classification of personal and sensitive data, consent management with audit trails, automated handling of data principal rights requests (access, correction, deletion), privacy impact assessments, breach notification workflows, and vendor/third-party risk management. This end-to-end automation reduces manual compliance effort and provides audit-ready documentation for India’s Data Protection Board.
Data discovery is the automated process of scanning and identifying where personal data resides across an organization’s entire digital environment including databases, file servers, cloud storage, SaaS applications, and email systems. For DPDP compliance, Indian organizations must know exactly what personal data they hold, where it is stored, and who has access to it before they can implement the required security safeguards, consent management, and data principal rights responses. Seqrite Data Privacy connects to 500+ data sources to provide this visibility automatically.
Under the DPDP Act, Indian organizations must obtain free, specific, informed, and unambiguous consent from individuals before processing their personal data. Consent management involves capturing consent at the point of data collection, recording it with timestamps, allowing individuals to review and withdraw consent at any time, and ensuring that data processing stops when consent is withdrawn. Seqrite Data Privacy provides a centralized consent management module that automates consent capture, tracks consent status in real time, and generates full audit trails to demonstrate compliance.
Yes. The DPDP Act allows cross-border transfer of personal data from India, but only to countries that are not specifically restricted by the Central Government. The Government of India maintains a list of countries to which transfers are restricted based on data protection adequacy or national security considerations. Indian organizations engaged in global operations should monitor this list and ensure that international data transfers to partner entities or cloud service providers comply with the Act’s cross-border transfer provisions.
Under the DPDP Act, Data Fiduciaries must notify the Data Protection Board without undue delay upon discovering a personal data breach. A detailed report must be submitted within 72 hours of discovery, covering the nature of the breach, the categories and approximate volume of personal data affected, the likely impact on Data Principals, and the remedial measures taken or planned. Affected individuals must also be notified. Seqrite Data Privacy automates breach detection alerts and provides customizable notification templates to help Indian organizations meet these tight reporting deadlines.
Data privacy governs who has the right to access personal data and how it should be used it is fundamentally about the rights of individuals over their information. Data protection refers to the technical and organizational measures encryption, access controls, DLP tools, backups used to secure data from unauthorized access, loss, or breaches. Indian organizations need both: data privacy to comply with the DPDP Act and respect individuals’ rights, and data protection to prevent the security incidents that would trigger those privacy obligations in the first place. Seqrite’s Data Privacy platform addresses both dimensions in a unified solution.