The Privacy Partnership Podcast with Robert Bateman
Robert Bateman provides the latest on data protection and privacy, with regular solo news updates and short-form interviews. Brought to you by Privacy Partnership: www.privacypartnership.com
Episodes
51 episodes
Web scraping under the GDPR: The EDPB's uncharacteristically pragmatic solution
Can you scrape the internet for AI training data without completely running afoul of the GDPR? The European Data Protection Board (EDPB) has finally offered an answer: Yes, but get ready to implement a massive amount of filtering.In this...
The EDPB's new anonymisation framework: 5 things you need to know
This week, Robert Bateman breaks down the newly adopted EDPB Guidelines 02/2026 on Anonymisation. Dragging the ancient 2014 Working Party 29 framework into the age of generative AI and EU data spaces, these new rules are dense, highly technical...
Rob rambles about Trump v Slaughter from a European perspective
A longer edition of the podcast because Rob gets unreasonably animated about EU-US data transfers.On 29 June 2026 the US Supreme Court ruled that the Federal Trade Commission's protection from presidential removal is unconstitutional, ov...
CalPrivacy Director Tom Kemp on how businesses should approach California's robust privacy regulation
What happens when a Silicon Valley cybersecurity founder takes the reins at one of the world's most powerful privacy regulators?In this special edition of the Privacy Partnership Podcast, Robert Bateman is joined by Tom Kemp, Executive D...
The death of the EU-US DPF? Trump v Slaughter and the future of transatlantic data flows
Did the US Supreme Court just sign the death warrant for the EU-US Data Privacy Framework (DPF)? In this explosive episode of the Privacy Partnership Podcast, Robert Bateman breaks down yesterday's monumental 6-3 SCOTUS decision in Trump v....
Data transfers at the Irish courts: A partial win for TikTok
The Irish High Court has just delivered a massive judgment in TikTok’s appeal against the Data Protection Commission (DPC). The court upheld a staggering €530 million fine—but surprisingly tore up the regulator’s order to suspend TikTok's data ...
John Edwards resigns! A look back at his time at the ICO
John Edwards has abruptly resigned as the UK Information Commissioner via a LinkedIn post, leaving behind a rather complicated legacy. In this episode, Robert Bateman looks back at Edwards’ four-and-a-half-year tenure. We unpack an era defined ...
Data transfers: How encryption and SCCs failed to save Yango Taxi from a €100 million fine
f you’re going to encrypt European personal data before transferring it to a high-risk jurisdiction, the golden rule is simple: don't leave the encryption keys on the exact same server.In this episode, Robert Bateman unpacks a staggering...
AI Act loophole? How one company navigated the ban on workplace emotion recognition
Can an employer use AI to read its employees' Slack and Teams messages to diagnose their stress levels? Under the EU AI Act, that sounds like a clear violation of the ban on workplace emotion recognition. Yet, one AI company, Myndoor, just surv...
Regulating the reality of adtech: The ICO’s recommended PECR reforms
The internet’s worst-kept secret is that basic digital advertising operations involve breaking privacy laws millions of times a day. But instead of dropping the enforcement hammer, the ICO is proposing a novel solution: just make it legal.<...
Decoding the AI Act: A first look at the Commission’s "high-risk" draft guidelines
The European Commission just dropped its highly anticipated first set of draft guidelines on high-risk AI classification under the AI Act—all 150 pages of them. Published for stakeholder consultation on May 19th, 2026, this document is the clos...
Get 40% off an ICO fine! The South Staffordshire case and early settlements
How do you knock 40% off a looming data protection fine? In this episode of the Privacy Partnership Podcast, Rob Bateman breaks down the recent £963,900 penalty handed down by the ICO to South Staffordshire Plc and explores the fascinating proc...
RTM v Bonne Terre: Court of Appeal redraws the line on consent
The Court of Appeal has ruled that consent under the UK GDPR and PECR is objective. A data subject's hidden vulnerabilities are not, in themselves, decisive, and even a controller's constructive knowledge of those vulnerabilities is not a stand...
What actually counts as 'scientific research'? Here's the EDPB's six-point answer
On 15 April 2026, the European Data Protection Board adopted Guidelines 1/2026 on the processing of personal data for scientific research purposes. The 66-page document is now out for public consultation.In this episode, Robert Bateman b...
'Clarity in action'?! The EDPB's 2025 annual report and litigation battles
In this episode, Rob looks at the newly published European Data Protection Board (EDPB) annual report for 2025. We are skipping the usual backward-looking statistics to focus entirely on the regulator's pipeline for 2026 and the massive multi-f...
AI in recruitment: ICO highlights poor practices as UK overhauls automated decision-making rules
Are your hiring managers quietly letting an algorithm bin hundreds of job applications while claiming a human is technically in charge?This week on the Privacy Partnership Podcast, Rob unpacks a massive structural shift in the UK’s frame...
Brillen Rottler: A German optician fights back against 'abusive' DSARs
Are you seeing a rise in "copy-paste" Data Subject Access Requests (DSARs) designed primarily to extract a quick financial settlement?In this episode of the Privacy Partnership Podcast, Robert Bateman unpacks a highly practical new judgm...
Amazon's €746m fine overturned: But who actually won this case?
A €746 million GDPR fine gets completely annulled by a Luxembourg court. A massive, unmitigated victory for big tech, right? Not exactly. In this episode of the Privacy Partnership Podcast, Robert Bateman dissects the highly anticipated March 1...
Invisible, indestructible signatures: The AI Act’s text watermarking problem
Can you hide an indestructible, imperceptible signature inside a basic marketing blog post? The European Commission seems to think you should try. Following the release of the Second Draft of the Code of Practice on Transparency of AI-Generated...
Are you a 'data broker'? Maybe, under the EDPB’s expanding definition
Are you a data broker? You might not think so, but European regulators could soon be looking at your business model and concluding otherwise.In this episode of the Privacy Partnership Podcast, Robert Bateman breaks down a revealing marke...
Reddit’s £14.5m fine and the “hard problem” of age assurance
The ICO has issued a £14.47 million fine against Reddit for alleged children's privacy failures, officially signaling the end of the road for the age verification "honour system." But with the full penalty notice yet to be published, what can p...
EDPB highlights "right to erasure" inadequacies: Exceptions, backups, and pseudonymisation
Rob presents a few highlights from the EDPB's latest Coordinated Enforcement Framework report on the "right to erasure".- Poor storage limitation and retention schedule practices are leading to issues satisfying erasure requests.
CJEU: Private companies CAN sue the EDPB
In this episode of the Privacy and Partnership podcast, Rob discusses a significant ruling from the CJEU regarding WhatsApp's legal challenge against the European Data Protection Board (EDPB). The CJEU's decision allows c...
The ICO's planned 'experimentation regime' to attract AI firms to the UK
Rob discusses the recent letter from the Information Commissioner's Office (ICO) to UK government officials, highlighting the ICO's focus on economic growth and innovation. The ICO plans a statutory code of practice for AI and an "e...
Happy Data Protection Day! A brief history of UK data protection law
On Data Protection Day 2026, Rob talks us briefly through the history of data protection in the UK: From the "data users" of the Data Protection Act 1984 to the "recognised legitimate interests" of last year's Data (Use and Access) Act.<...