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Countries

IsraelChecked 18 August 2026

Yes, with paperworkWork: HighEnforcement: Active

In one paragraph: Israeli data can go abroad, but never by default. Either the destination country protects data as well as Israel does, or you fit one of eight listed exceptions — usually a contract in which the receiver promises to follow Israeli rules. A big reform started on 14 August 2025 and the regulator now issues real fines. No industry bans exports outright, but several add heavy conditions.
The catch: The general answer is 'yes, with paperwork'. It stops being true in four places. Banks may not put sensitive customer data on a cloud outside Israel unless they have checked the provider meets European-level protection. Insurers and pension bodies must report every offshore outsourcing arrangement to their regulator each year. Identifiable patient data used for research must generally stay inside the hospital or health fund that holds it, not merely inside Israel. And central government has moved its own cloud into Israeli data-centre regions on purpose, so selling cloud to the state effectively requires an Israeli region.
Does this apply to me?: Yes, it can reach a foreign company with no office in Israel — but the law never says so in words. Israeli privacy law simply applies to anyone who collects, uses or processes personal data, with no size or revenue threshold to fall under. There is no general requirement to appoint a local representative. Some organisations must appoint a privacy officer, and that person is allowed to be an outside contractor rather than a staff member.Medium confidence
Can the data leave the country?: Yes, with paperwork — and you must be able to name the route you are using. The default rule is that data may only go to a country whose law protects it at least as well as Israeli law does. If the destination fails that test, you have to fit one of eight listed exceptions, and whichever route you take you also need a written promise from the receiver. No Israeli industry has a flat 'the data stays here' rule, but four sectors bolt extra conditions on top.High confidence
What do I have to do to send it abroad?: The model is closest to an allowlist: you may not send data out unless the destination qualifies, and the qualifying list is already populated. It counts if the country signed the Council of Europe data protection convention, or if it receives data from European Union countries on the same terms — so Europe's approved-country list does much of the work. If your destination does not qualify, the usual fallback is a contract in which the receiver promises to meet Israeli standards. Either way you also need a separate written promise from the receiver that it will protect the data and pass it to nobody else.High confidence
Who enforces this — and are they actually working?: The Privacy Protection Authority, part of the Ministry of Justice, and it is fully operational. It has a serving commissioner, an administrative enforcement department, and it publishes its decisions with names and amounts. In 2026 it fined a national health fund about 256,000 shekels (roughly $72,000) for taking two months to report a security incident, and a small leisure company about 12,000 shekels (roughly $3,400) for a defective privacy notice. Industry regulators — the Bank of Israel, the insurance regulator and the Ministry of Health — enforce their own rules separately.High confidence
How long must I keep it, and when must I delete it?: There is a clear floor and a clear ceiling, and they sit close together. The floor: security and access-monitoring records must be kept for at least 24 months, and organisations with medium or high security databases must keep a restorable backup of them. The ceiling: if a database contains anything that came from Europe, you must run a mechanism that finds data you no longer need and delete it, and you must delete data on request. Where another law says you must keep something, that wins over the duty to delete.High confidence
What happens when something goes wrong?: There is one main clock and it has no hours attached to it: a severe security incident must be reported to the Privacy Protection Authority immediately, along with what you did about it. 'Immediately' is taken literally — a health fund was fined for a two-month delay. Telling the affected people is not automatic; the Authority decides, after consulting the national cyber agency, and can order you to notify them. Israel has no general law forcing every company to report cyber incidents to the state, so your second clock, if you have one, comes from your industry regulator.High confidence
What's the trap?: Five things that are not in the summary. One: a single record that arrived from Europe drags the whole database into the stricter European rules — since 1 January 2025 those rules apply to any other data sitting in the same database. Two: 'immediately' really means immediately, and there is no safe 72-hour habit to fall back on. Three: fines are calculated per person, not as a flat cap, so a large database turns a small breach into a very large bill. Four: privacy breaches are criminal offences, not just regulatory ones, with prison terms attached. Five: 'data security officer' and 'data protection officer' are two different Israeli roles with different triggers, and having one does not satisfy the other.High confidence
What's about to change?: The big change already happened on 14 August 2025. What is landing now is the detail underneath it. In April 2026 the regulator finalised its binding rules on the contract you must sign before sending data abroad, and separate regulations came into force giving a short grace period — a warning instead of a fine — for brand-new obligations. A guideline applying privacy law to artificial intelligence, including a requirement of consent before scraping the web to train models, is also in play. Watch three switches the government can flip without warning.Medium confidence
Hardest industry wall: Health and social care — חוזרי מנכ"ל משרד הבריאות 1/2018 ו-2/2018 - שימושים משניים במידע בריאות
Government — פרויקט נימבוס - מדיניות הענן הממשלתית

MaltaChecked 18 August 2026

Depends on your industryWork: MediumEnforcement: Active

In one paragraph: Malta runs on the European rulebook. Data may go abroad once the right paperwork is in place, and there is no general rule that it must stay on the island. Two things break that. Online gaming companies must keep their core systems inside Europe. And any Maltese company that keeps its books abroad must still keep a copy of its accounts in Malta.
The catch: The easy answer stops being true in three places. First, online gaming, which is Malta's biggest regulated industry: a licensed operator's 'key technical setup' — including the player database, the financial database and the control system — must sit in Malta or another European Economic Area country, unless the Malta Gaming Authority approves another location one case at a time. The same operator must also run a live mirror of its essential regulatory data that the Authority can reach at any moment, including physically. Second, company law: if a company keeps its accounting records outside Malta, it must still send to Malta, and keep in Malta, accounts and returns good enough to show the financial position at least every six months. Third, government: the public administration's own cloud policy says cloud services should as a rule be inside the European Union or European Economic Area, and anything classified must go on the government's own cloud. Banking, payments, insurance, securities, health, education and mapping have no storage-location rule that we could find, checked 18 August 2026.
Does this apply to me?: Yes. Malta's Data Protection Act reaches a company with no office in Malta if it offers goods or services to people in Malta, or watches their behaviour in Malta. There is no size or revenue threshold. There is no extra Maltese representative to appoint beyond the one the European rules already require of companies based outside Europe.High confidence
Can the data leave the country?: In general, yes. Malta has no law saying personal data must be stored on the island. It follows the European Union rules: send data outside Europe once you have an approved destination or the right contract. Three areas override that. Online gaming is the big one, and it is Malta's flagship industry.High confidence
What do I have to do to send it abroad?: Use the European toolkit. Send data to a country the European Commission has approved, or sign the European standard contract, or use approved group-wide rules. Malta adds nothing on top. Malta's own minister has a power to restrict transfers of named categories of data, but has never used it, so the list of Maltese restrictions is empty today.High confidence
Who enforces this — and are they actually working?: The Information and Data Protection Commissioner. It is real, staffed and issuing decisions: its public register shows around nineteen decisions published in 2026 and thirty-eight in 2025. The fines are small by European standards — most sit between about 2,000 and 20,000 euros (roughly $2,300 to $23,000). The gaming regulator is the harder one, and it cancels licences.High confidence
How long must I keep it, and when must I delete it?: There is a floor and a ceiling. The floor: company accounting records for ten years, tax and value-added-tax records for at least six years, and anti-money-laundering records for five years. The ceiling: the European rule that you delete personal data once you no longer need it. Where they clash, the specific Maltese law that orders you to keep something wins, because keeping it is then a legal duty.High confidence
What happens when something goes wrong?: Count three clocks, and they do not line up. Seventy-two hours to tell the privacy regulator about a personal data breach. Twenty-four hours to send a first warning about a serious cyber incident, then seventy-two hours for the full report and one month for the final one. Phone and internet companies have their own separate duty to report straight away.High confidence
What's the trap?: Five things that are not in the summary. A child in Malta is thirteen, not sixteen. Health and biometric research needs the regulator's written permission before you start, not just a risk assessment. Copying someone's identity card is restricted. Leaking a client secret can be a crime, not a fine. And the gaming regulator can keep personal data forever, in a law that says so out loud.High confidence
What's about to change?: Three dated changes. On 1 January 2027 a new law stops insurers, banks and employers asking about a cancer diagnosis once enough time has passed since treatment. On 12 January 2027 European rules make cloud switching and data export fees free. And Malta's artificial intelligence rules started phasing in on 2 August 2026, with the privacy regulator now policing the market.High confidence
Hardest industry wall: All industries — Att dwar il-Kumpaniji (Kap. 386), artikolu 163

The eight framework questions answered for each selected country
Question	IsraelChecked 18 August 2026	MaltaChecked 18 August 2026
The three ratings	Yes, with paperwork Work: High Enforcement: Active	Depends on your industry Work: Medium Enforcement: Active
In one paragraph	Israeli data can go abroad, but never by default. Either the destination country protects data as well as Israel does, or you fit one of eight listed exceptions — usually a contract in which the receiver promises to follow Israeli rules. A big reform started on 14 August 2025 and the regulator now issues real fines. No industry bans exports outright, but several add heavy conditions.	Malta runs on the European rulebook. Data may go abroad once the right paperwork is in place, and there is no general rule that it must stay on the island. Two things break that. Online gaming companies must keep their core systems inside Europe. And any Maltese company that keeps its books abroad must still keep a copy of its accounts in Malta.
The catch	The general answer is 'yes, with paperwork'. It stops being true in four places. Banks may not put sensitive customer data on a cloud outside Israel unless they have checked the provider meets European-level protection. Insurers and pension bodies must report every offshore outsourcing arrangement to their regulator each year. Identifiable patient data used for research must generally stay inside the hospital or health fund that holds it, not merely inside Israel. And central government has moved its own cloud into Israeli data-centre regions on purpose, so selling cloud to the state effectively requires an Israeli region.	The easy answer stops being true in three places. First, online gaming, which is Malta's biggest regulated industry: a licensed operator's 'key technical setup' — including the player database, the financial database and the control system — must sit in Malta or another European Economic Area country, unless the Malta Gaming Authority approves another location one case at a time. The same operator must also run a live mirror of its essential regulatory data that the Authority can reach at any moment, including physically. Second, company law: if a company keeps its accounting records outside Malta, it must still send to Malta, and keep in Malta, accounts and returns good enough to show the financial position at least every six months. Third, government: the public administration's own cloud policy says cloud services should as a rule be inside the European Union or European Economic Area, and anything classified must go on the government's own cloud. Banking, payments, insurance, securities, health, education and mapping have no storage-location rule that we could find, checked 18 August 2026.
Does this apply to me?	Yes, it can reach a foreign company with no office in Israel — but the law never says so in words. Israeli privacy law simply applies to anyone who collects, uses or processes personal data, with no size or revenue threshold to fall under. There is no general requirement to appoint a local representative. Some organisations must appoint a privacy officer, and that person is allowed to be an outside contractor rather than a staff member.Medium confidence	Yes. Malta's Data Protection Act reaches a company with no office in Malta if it offers goods or services to people in Malta, or watches their behaviour in Malta. There is no size or revenue threshold. There is no extra Maltese representative to appoint beyond the one the European rules already require of companies based outside Europe.High confidence
Can the data leave the country?	Yes, with paperwork — and you must be able to name the route you are using. The default rule is that data may only go to a country whose law protects it at least as well as Israeli law does. If the destination fails that test, you have to fit one of eight listed exceptions, and whichever route you take you also need a written promise from the receiver. No Israeli industry has a flat 'the data stays here' rule, but four sectors bolt extra conditions on top.High confidence	In general, yes. Malta has no law saying personal data must be stored on the island. It follows the European Union rules: send data outside Europe once you have an approved destination or the right contract. Three areas override that. Online gaming is the big one, and it is Malta's flagship industry.High confidence
What do I have to do to send it abroad?	The model is closest to an allowlist: you may not send data out unless the destination qualifies, and the qualifying list is already populated. It counts if the country signed the Council of Europe data protection convention, or if it receives data from European Union countries on the same terms — so Europe's approved-country list does much of the work. If your destination does not qualify, the usual fallback is a contract in which the receiver promises to meet Israeli standards. Either way you also need a separate written promise from the receiver that it will protect the data and pass it to nobody else.High confidence	Use the European toolkit. Send data to a country the European Commission has approved, or sign the European standard contract, or use approved group-wide rules. Malta adds nothing on top. Malta's own minister has a power to restrict transfers of named categories of data, but has never used it, so the list of Maltese restrictions is empty today.High confidence
Who enforces this — and are they actually working?	The Privacy Protection Authority, part of the Ministry of Justice, and it is fully operational. It has a serving commissioner, an administrative enforcement department, and it publishes its decisions with names and amounts. In 2026 it fined a national health fund about 256,000 shekels (roughly $72,000) for taking two months to report a security incident, and a small leisure company about 12,000 shekels (roughly $3,400) for a defective privacy notice. Industry regulators — the Bank of Israel, the insurance regulator and the Ministry of Health — enforce their own rules separately.High confidence	The Information and Data Protection Commissioner. It is real, staffed and issuing decisions: its public register shows around nineteen decisions published in 2026 and thirty-eight in 2025. The fines are small by European standards — most sit between about 2,000 and 20,000 euros (roughly $2,300 to $23,000). The gaming regulator is the harder one, and it cancels licences.High confidence
How long must I keep it, and when must I delete it?	There is a clear floor and a clear ceiling, and they sit close together. The floor: security and access-monitoring records must be kept for at least 24 months, and organisations with medium or high security databases must keep a restorable backup of them. The ceiling: if a database contains anything that came from Europe, you must run a mechanism that finds data you no longer need and delete it, and you must delete data on request. Where another law says you must keep something, that wins over the duty to delete.High confidence	There is a floor and a ceiling. The floor: company accounting records for ten years, tax and value-added-tax records for at least six years, and anti-money-laundering records for five years. The ceiling: the European rule that you delete personal data once you no longer need it. Where they clash, the specific Maltese law that orders you to keep something wins, because keeping it is then a legal duty.High confidence
What happens when something goes wrong?	There is one main clock and it has no hours attached to it: a severe security incident must be reported to the Privacy Protection Authority immediately, along with what you did about it. 'Immediately' is taken literally — a health fund was fined for a two-month delay. Telling the affected people is not automatic; the Authority decides, after consulting the national cyber agency, and can order you to notify them. Israel has no general law forcing every company to report cyber incidents to the state, so your second clock, if you have one, comes from your industry regulator.High confidence	Count three clocks, and they do not line up. Seventy-two hours to tell the privacy regulator about a personal data breach. Twenty-four hours to send a first warning about a serious cyber incident, then seventy-two hours for the full report and one month for the final one. Phone and internet companies have their own separate duty to report straight away.High confidence
What's the trap?	Five things that are not in the summary. One: a single record that arrived from Europe drags the whole database into the stricter European rules — since 1 January 2025 those rules apply to any other data sitting in the same database. Two: 'immediately' really means immediately, and there is no safe 72-hour habit to fall back on. Three: fines are calculated per person, not as a flat cap, so a large database turns a small breach into a very large bill. Four: privacy breaches are criminal offences, not just regulatory ones, with prison terms attached. Five: 'data security officer' and 'data protection officer' are two different Israeli roles with different triggers, and having one does not satisfy the other.High confidence	Five things that are not in the summary. A child in Malta is thirteen, not sixteen. Health and biometric research needs the regulator's written permission before you start, not just a risk assessment. Copying someone's identity card is restricted. Leaking a client secret can be a crime, not a fine. And the gaming regulator can keep personal data forever, in a law that says so out loud.High confidence
What's about to change?	The big change already happened on 14 August 2025. What is landing now is the detail underneath it. In April 2026 the regulator finalised its binding rules on the contract you must sign before sending data abroad, and separate regulations came into force giving a short grace period — a warning instead of a fine — for brand-new obligations. A guideline applying privacy law to artificial intelligence, including a requirement of consent before scraping the web to train models, is also in play. Watch three switches the government can flip without warning.Medium confidence	Three dated changes. On 1 January 2027 a new law stops insurers, banks and employers asking about a cancer diagnosis once enough time has passed since treatment. On 12 January 2027 European rules make cloud switching and data export fees free. And Malta's artificial intelligence rules started phasing in on 2 August 2026, with the privacy regulator now policing the market.High confidence
Hardest industry wall	Health and social care — חוזרי מנכ"ל משרד הבריאות 1/2018 ו-2/2018 - שימושים משניים במידע בריאות Government — פרויקט נימבוס - מדיניות הענן הממשלתית	All industries — Att dwar il-Kumpaniji (Kap. 386), artikolu 163