What does “accountability” mean under EU Data Protection law?

Food price investigation — Com’r Hartigan (LOC) — 1914 — The Library of Congress

There are seven basic data protection principles under EU data protection law. The principles lie at the heart of the law and, although they don’t give hard and fast rules, they embody the spirit of the regulatory framework. Therefore, compliance with the principles is a fundamental building block to any good data protection practice. The seven principles are:

1. Lawfulness, fairness and transparency
2. Purpose limitation
3. Data minimization
4. Accuracy
5. Storage limitation
6. Integrity and confidentiality (security)
7. Accountability

The seventh principle is the principle of “accountability” (GDPR Article 5 (2)).

Article 5 of GDPR

2. The controller shall be responsible for, and be able to demonstrate compliance with, paragraph 1 (‘accountability’).

[See also Articles 77, 82 and 83 of GDPR]

The principle of “accountability”

The accountability principle requires controllers and processors to take responsibility for their processing activities and…