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Two or three countries, side by side, one row per question. Pick up to 3.

Countries

ChileChecked 18 August 2026

Yes, with paperworkWork: MediumEnforcement: Waking up

In one paragraph: Chile is about to change completely. Today its 1999 privacy law says nothing at all about sending data abroad, and there is no privacy regulator. On 1 December 2026 a rewritten law switches on: transfers abroad will need a legal safeguard, and a new agency will be able to fine up to 4 percent of a company's Chilean sales. No industry has to keep data inside Chile.
The catch: Nothing in Chile forces data to stay in the country, in any industry we could find. The sector rules bite in other ways: internet providers must keep a year of connection records, hospitals and clinics must keep patient files for fifteen years, foreign financial technology firms must have an address in Chile, and firms running essential services must report a cyber attack within three hours.
Does this apply to me?: Yes. From 1 December 2026 the rewritten law reaches any company anywhere that offers goods or services to people in Chile, or that watches their behaviour online, even with no office and no staff in the country. There is no size or revenue threshold. You do not need a local representative, but you must publish a working email address or similar contact point that both customers and the regulator can use.High confidence
Can the data leave the country?: Today, yes, with nothing to sign: the privacy law in force in Chile right now does not mention sending data abroad at all. From 1 December 2026 that ends. After that date a transfer abroad is only lawful if the destination country has been declared adequate, or you have a contract or binding group rules with proper safeguards, or you fit a narrow exception. No industry in Chile has to keep a copy of data inside the country.High confidence
What do I have to do to send it abroad?: From 1 December 2026 there are three main routes: send to a country the new agency has declared adequate, sign a contract or adopt binding group-wide rules that give people the same protection they have in Chile, or use an approved certification. If none of those fit, you can ask the agency to approve one specific transfer. Right now the agency does not exist, so there is no list of approved countries and no official model contract to copy.High confidence
Who enforces this — and are they actually working?: Today, nobody. Chile has no privacy regulator: a person has to sue in a civil court, and the judge can fine between one and ten monthly tax units, roughly 70,000 to 700,000 Chilean pesos, or about 75 to 750 US dollars. A real regulator, the Personal Data Protection Agency, starts on 1 December 2026 with power to fine millions. As of 18 August 2026 we found no official confirmation that its three board members have been appointed, and the law wanted them named around 1 June 2026.Medium confidence
How long must I keep it, and when must I delete it?: There is a floor and a ceiling, and they come from different laws. The floors: internet and phone companies keep one year of connection records, and hospitals and clinics keep patient files for at least fifteen years. The ceilings: from 1 December 2026 personal data may only be kept as long as the purpose needs, then it must be deleted or made anonymous, and unpaid debts may not be reported after five years. Where a specific law orders you to keep something, that beats the general delete-it rule.High confidence
What happens when something goes wrong?: Count two clocks. If you run an essential service, a significant cyber attack must be reported to the national cyber agency within three hours, updated at seventy-two hours, and closed with a final report within fifteen days. Separately, from 1 December 2026, a personal data breach must be reported to the privacy agency by the fastest available means and without undue delay, with no fixed number of hours, and the affected people must also be told when sensitive data, data about children under fourteen or credit and banking data is involved.High confidence
What's the trap?: Five. (1) A child is anyone under fourteen and needs a parent's consent; teenagers aged fourteen to seventeen are treated as adults, except that sensitive data about under-sixteens still needs a parent. (2) If someone asks you to freeze their data you have two working days to answer, not thirty. (3) Unpaid debts vanish from credit reporting after five years and immediately once paid, and you have seven working days to pass on the news. (4) Congress, the courts, the central bank and other independent bodies write their own privacy rules and are outside the agency's reach. (5) Online gambling is not licensable in Chile at all.High confidence
What's about to change?: One date dominates: 1 December 2026, when the rewritten privacy law starts and the new agency gets its powers. Before then the government has to name the agency's three board members and issue the regulations the law requires. For the first twelve months the agency may let small firms off with a written warning instead of a fine. Watch three switches the government can flip without asking anyone.Medium confidence
Hardest industry wall: None found.

AlgeriaChecked 18 August 2026

Yes, with paperworkWork: HighEnforcement: Waking up

In one paragraph: Data can leave Algeria, but not freely. Every transfer abroad needs the national data protection authority's permission unless a listed exception applies, and breaking that rule is a crime carrying prison. Since July 2025 every organisation must have a data protection officer, a processing register and an automatic log of every operation. The regulator is staffed but has issued no known decisions.
The catch: The national rule is already strict, and three areas are stricter still. Online shops must run their site on servers inside Algeria under a .com.dz address. Electronic trust services, such as digital signatures and electronic identity, must host all the data they collect inside Algeria. Public bodies must exchange data only over a state-run network that is deliberately kept separate from the internet. Banking, insurance and securities have no storage rule that we could find, but the central bank's own website could not be reached, so treat that as unchecked rather than settled.
Does this apply to me?: Yes, it can reach a company with no office in Algeria, but the trigger is equipment, not customers. You are covered if you are set up in Algeria, or if you use any means of processing located in Algeria, such as servers or devices. In that second case you must tell the regulator the name of a representative based in Algeria, and that person takes on your rights and duties. There is no size or revenue threshold to fall below.High confidence
Can the data leave the country?: Yes, with permission or a listed excuse. The starting rule is that you may only send personal data to another country if the national data protection authority allows it and that country protects privacy well enough. There is a short list of exceptions that most businesses will rely on instead, such as the person's express consent or a transfer that is needed to carry out their contract. Two things are banned outright: transfers that could harm public safety or the state's vital interests, and any processing of sensitive data such as health, religion, politics or trade union membership unless a narrow exception applies.High confidence
What do I have to do to send it abroad?: The model is case by case. Before data goes abroad you need the national data protection authority to authorise it, and the destination country must protect privacy well enough in the authority's judgement. There is no published list of approved countries and no official standard contract you can sign instead. In practice most companies rely on the written exceptions: the person's express consent, a transfer needed for their contract, a court claim, saving someone's life, an important public interest, an international mutual legal assistance request, medical care, or a treaty Algeria has signed.High confidence
Who enforces this — and are they actually working?: The national data protection authority, and it does exist in real life. Fifteen members, including a president, were appointed by presidential decree on 18 May 2022 for five years, a new president was appointed in October 2023, and the authority has its own staff, pay scales, an executive secretariat, an official bulletin and internal committees. Its president was still signing published decisions in August 2025. What is missing is enforcement: in four years the official gazette shows only housekeeping texts from the authority, and no fine, order or filing procedure. Treat it as awake but not yet biting.High confidence
How long must I keep it, and when must I delete it?: There is a floor and a ceiling, and the floor is the one people miss. Accounting books and the paperwork behind them must be kept for ten years after the end of each financial year. Telephone and internet providers must keep the data that identifies users and their connections for one year. Online sellers must keep records of every transaction and send them to the national trade register centre. The ceiling is that personal data must not be kept in a form that identifies people for longer than the purpose needs, and keeping it too long is a crime.High confidence
What happens when something goes wrong?: There is no seventy-two hour clock here, and the five-day deadline people quote is not for ordinary businesses. If you provide a service over a public electronic communications network and data is destroyed, lost, altered, disclosed or accessed without permission, you must warn the authority and the affected person straight away, with no fixed number of hours. Failing to do that is a crime punishable by one to three years in prison. The five-day deadline added in July 2025 applies to police, prosecutors, courts and prison services, not to a normal company.High confidence
What's the trap?: Five things that cost people their weekend. One: this is a criminal regime. Sending data abroad in breach of the rule is punished by one to five years in prison and a fine of up to one million dinars, roughly seven thousand seven hundred US dollars, and prison can attach to individuals. Two: since 24 July 2025 every organisation must appoint a data protection officer, keep a written register of processing and keep an automatic log recording every collection, consultation, disclosure and deletion, with no exemption for small companies. Three: sensitive data is banned by default, and consent must be express, so silence or a pre-ticked box is worth nothing. Four: anything to do with national defence and security now sits completely outside the law, so there is no privacy protection to point to there. Five: a 2021 ordinance makes it a crime to disclose classified administrative documents, it reaches acts committed outside Algeria against the Algerian state, and it can force any person to hand over stored data.High confidence
What's about to change?: Three things to watch in the next twelve months. The five-year terms of the data protection authority's members, appointed on 18 May 2022, run out in May 2027, so appointments are due. The regional inspection and audit units created for the authority in July 2025 still need an implementing regulation before inspectors can appear at your door. And the rules that switch on the new government data framework, two reference documents on classifying data and cataloguing data sources, can be published by a single decision of the High Commission for Digitalisation, at which point every public body and every company running a public service must classify and catalogue its data.High confidence
Hardest industry wall: Telecoms — Loi n° 26-02 fixant les regles generales relatives aux services de confiance pour les transactions electroniques et a l'identification electronique
E-commerce — Loi n° 18-05 relative au commerce electronique
Government — Decret presidentiel n° 25-320 portant mise en place d'un dispositif national de gouvernance des donnees

The same eight topics answered for each selected country
Question	ChileChecked 18 August 2026	AlgeriaChecked 18 August 2026
The three ratings	Yes, with paperwork Work: Medium Enforcement: Waking up	Yes, with paperwork Work: High Enforcement: Waking up
In one paragraph	Chile is about to change completely. Today its 1999 privacy law says nothing at all about sending data abroad, and there is no privacy regulator. On 1 December 2026 a rewritten law switches on: transfers abroad will need a legal safeguard, and a new agency will be able to fine up to 4 percent of a company's Chilean sales. No industry has to keep data inside Chile.	Data can leave Algeria, but not freely. Every transfer abroad needs the national data protection authority's permission unless a listed exception applies, and breaking that rule is a crime carrying prison. Since July 2025 every organisation must have a data protection officer, a processing register and an automatic log of every operation. The regulator is staffed but has issued no known decisions.
The catch	Nothing in Chile forces data to stay in the country, in any industry we could find. The sector rules bite in other ways: internet providers must keep a year of connection records, hospitals and clinics must keep patient files for fifteen years, foreign financial technology firms must have an address in Chile, and firms running essential services must report a cyber attack within three hours.	The national rule is already strict, and three areas are stricter still. Online shops must run their site on servers inside Algeria under a .com.dz address. Electronic trust services, such as digital signatures and electronic identity, must host all the data they collect inside Algeria. Public bodies must exchange data only over a state-run network that is deliberately kept separate from the internet. Banking, insurance and securities have no storage rule that we could find, but the central bank's own website could not be reached, so treat that as unchecked rather than settled.
Does this apply to me?	Yes. From 1 December 2026 the rewritten law reaches any company anywhere that offers goods or services to people in Chile, or that watches their behaviour online, even with no office and no staff in the country. There is no size or revenue threshold. You do not need a local representative, but you must publish a working email address or similar contact point that both customers and the regulator can use.High confidence	Yes, it can reach a company with no office in Algeria, but the trigger is equipment, not customers. You are covered if you are set up in Algeria, or if you use any means of processing located in Algeria, such as servers or devices. In that second case you must tell the regulator the name of a representative based in Algeria, and that person takes on your rights and duties. There is no size or revenue threshold to fall below.High confidence
Can the data leave the country?	Today, yes, with nothing to sign: the privacy law in force in Chile right now does not mention sending data abroad at all. From 1 December 2026 that ends. After that date a transfer abroad is only lawful if the destination country has been declared adequate, or you have a contract or binding group rules with proper safeguards, or you fit a narrow exception. No industry in Chile has to keep a copy of data inside the country.High confidence	Yes, with permission or a listed excuse. The starting rule is that you may only send personal data to another country if the national data protection authority allows it and that country protects privacy well enough. There is a short list of exceptions that most businesses will rely on instead, such as the person's express consent or a transfer that is needed to carry out their contract. Two things are banned outright: transfers that could harm public safety or the state's vital interests, and any processing of sensitive data such as health, religion, politics or trade union membership unless a narrow exception applies.High confidence
What do I have to do to send it abroad?	From 1 December 2026 there are three main routes: send to a country the new agency has declared adequate, sign a contract or adopt binding group-wide rules that give people the same protection they have in Chile, or use an approved certification. If none of those fit, you can ask the agency to approve one specific transfer. Right now the agency does not exist, so there is no list of approved countries and no official model contract to copy.High confidence	The model is case by case. Before data goes abroad you need the national data protection authority to authorise it, and the destination country must protect privacy well enough in the authority's judgement. There is no published list of approved countries and no official standard contract you can sign instead. In practice most companies rely on the written exceptions: the person's express consent, a transfer needed for their contract, a court claim, saving someone's life, an important public interest, an international mutual legal assistance request, medical care, or a treaty Algeria has signed.High confidence
Who enforces this — and are they actually working?	Today, nobody. Chile has no privacy regulator: a person has to sue in a civil court, and the judge can fine between one and ten monthly tax units, roughly 70,000 to 700,000 Chilean pesos, or about 75 to 750 US dollars. A real regulator, the Personal Data Protection Agency, starts on 1 December 2026 with power to fine millions. As of 18 August 2026 we found no official confirmation that its three board members have been appointed, and the law wanted them named around 1 June 2026.Medium confidence	The national data protection authority, and it does exist in real life. Fifteen members, including a president, were appointed by presidential decree on 18 May 2022 for five years, a new president was appointed in October 2023, and the authority has its own staff, pay scales, an executive secretariat, an official bulletin and internal committees. Its president was still signing published decisions in August 2025. What is missing is enforcement: in four years the official gazette shows only housekeeping texts from the authority, and no fine, order or filing procedure. Treat it as awake but not yet biting.High confidence
How long must I keep it, and when must I delete it?	There is a floor and a ceiling, and they come from different laws. The floors: internet and phone companies keep one year of connection records, and hospitals and clinics keep patient files for at least fifteen years. The ceilings: from 1 December 2026 personal data may only be kept as long as the purpose needs, then it must be deleted or made anonymous, and unpaid debts may not be reported after five years. Where a specific law orders you to keep something, that beats the general delete-it rule.High confidence	There is a floor and a ceiling, and the floor is the one people miss. Accounting books and the paperwork behind them must be kept for ten years after the end of each financial year. Telephone and internet providers must keep the data that identifies users and their connections for one year. Online sellers must keep records of every transaction and send them to the national trade register centre. The ceiling is that personal data must not be kept in a form that identifies people for longer than the purpose needs, and keeping it too long is a crime.High confidence
What happens when something goes wrong?	Count two clocks. If you run an essential service, a significant cyber attack must be reported to the national cyber agency within three hours, updated at seventy-two hours, and closed with a final report within fifteen days. Separately, from 1 December 2026, a personal data breach must be reported to the privacy agency by the fastest available means and without undue delay, with no fixed number of hours, and the affected people must also be told when sensitive data, data about children under fourteen or credit and banking data is involved.High confidence	There is no seventy-two hour clock here, and the five-day deadline people quote is not for ordinary businesses. If you provide a service over a public electronic communications network and data is destroyed, lost, altered, disclosed or accessed without permission, you must warn the authority and the affected person straight away, with no fixed number of hours. Failing to do that is a crime punishable by one to three years in prison. The five-day deadline added in July 2025 applies to police, prosecutors, courts and prison services, not to a normal company.High confidence
What's the trap?	Five. (1) A child is anyone under fourteen and needs a parent's consent; teenagers aged fourteen to seventeen are treated as adults, except that sensitive data about under-sixteens still needs a parent. (2) If someone asks you to freeze their data you have two working days to answer, not thirty. (3) Unpaid debts vanish from credit reporting after five years and immediately once paid, and you have seven working days to pass on the news. (4) Congress, the courts, the central bank and other independent bodies write their own privacy rules and are outside the agency's reach. (5) Online gambling is not licensable in Chile at all.High confidence	Five things that cost people their weekend. One: this is a criminal regime. Sending data abroad in breach of the rule is punished by one to five years in prison and a fine of up to one million dinars, roughly seven thousand seven hundred US dollars, and prison can attach to individuals. Two: since 24 July 2025 every organisation must appoint a data protection officer, keep a written register of processing and keep an automatic log recording every collection, consultation, disclosure and deletion, with no exemption for small companies. Three: sensitive data is banned by default, and consent must be express, so silence or a pre-ticked box is worth nothing. Four: anything to do with national defence and security now sits completely outside the law, so there is no privacy protection to point to there. Five: a 2021 ordinance makes it a crime to disclose classified administrative documents, it reaches acts committed outside Algeria against the Algerian state, and it can force any person to hand over stored data.High confidence
What's about to change?	One date dominates: 1 December 2026, when the rewritten privacy law starts and the new agency gets its powers. Before then the government has to name the agency's three board members and issue the regulations the law requires. For the first twelve months the agency may let small firms off with a written warning instead of a fine. Watch three switches the government can flip without asking anyone.Medium confidence	Three things to watch in the next twelve months. The five-year terms of the data protection authority's members, appointed on 18 May 2022, run out in May 2027, so appointments are due. The regional inspection and audit units created for the authority in July 2025 still need an implementing regulation before inspectors can appear at your door. And the rules that switch on the new government data framework, two reference documents on classifying data and cataloguing data sources, can be published by a single decision of the High Commission for Digitalisation, at which point every public body and every company running a public service must classify and catalogue its data.High confidence
Hardest industry wall	None found.	Telecoms — Loi n° 26-02 fixant les regles generales relatives aux services de confiance pour les transactions electroniques et a l'identification electronique E-commerce — Loi n° 18-05 relative au commerce electronique Government — Decret presidentiel n° 25-320 portant mise en place d'un dispositif national de gouvernance des donnees