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

Countries

ThailandChecked 18 August 2026

Yes, with paperworkWork: HighEnforcement: Active

In one paragraph: Thailand does not make you keep personal data inside the country, but data cannot leave until you have picked and documented a legal route. The regulator never published a list of approved destination countries, so consent and written safeguards do all the work. A foreign company selling into Thailand needs a named representative living there. Getting it wrong can mean fines, double damages, and in the worst cases jail.
The catch: The permissive headline is about residency only. The burden is high and the pain is elsewhere: a person in Thailand who answers for you personally, parental consent for anyone under twenty in many cases, 90-day traffic logs that catch any business offering guest wi-fi, compensation owed even when you were not careless, and a technology-crime regime that forces banks and telecoms companies to hand customer data into a government-run exchange. Payments, government workloads and digital platforms each add their own regulator gate on top.
Does this apply to me?: Yes. The privacy law reaches a company with no office in Thailand if it offers goods or services to people who are in Thailand, or if it tracks what those people do. Payment is irrelevant — a free service counts. There is no revenue or headcount floor to fall below. A foreign company caught this way must appoint, in writing, a representative who is physically in Thailand and who can be held answerable with no cap on liability.High confidence
Can the data leave the country?: Yes, in most cases. Thailand does not make companies keep a copy of personal data inside the country. But data cannot simply leave: you must first have a legal route, and the regulator has never published a list of approved destination countries, so the 'this country is safe enough' route is unusable in practice. Everyone falls back on informed consent, contract necessity, approved group-wide rules, or their own written safeguards. Several industries add a second gate on top, described below.High confidence
What do I have to do to send it abroad?: There is no permission slip to apply for and no banned-country list. You pick a route and document it before the data moves. The routes are: the destination is judged to have good enough protection; one of six statutory exceptions such as informed consent; group-wide rules certified by the regulator; or your own written safeguards that a person in Thailand could actually enforce. The 'good enough country' route is dead on arrival because the regulator has published no approved list, so in practice the safeguards route and consent do all the work.Medium confidence
Who enforces this — and are they actually working?: The Office of the Personal Data Protection Committee, usually shortened to PDPC, sits under the Ministry of Digital Economy and Society. It is real and staffed: it has a serving Secretary-General, it runs walk-in complaint centres in five provinces and opened another in Ubon Ratchathani on 17 August 2026, and it is executing Cabinet-level instructions on data breaches. Complaints are decided by an Expert Committee that can order you to stop, order you to fix things, and impose fines itself. Other regulators run their own lanes: the cyber-security agency for critical infrastructure, the central bank for payments, and the electronic transactions agency for digital platforms.Medium confidence
How long must I keep it, and when must I delete it?: Thailand pushes in both directions at once. The floor: anyone who provides a computer or internet service to other people must keep traffic logs for at least 90 days, and an official can order that stretched to as much as two years. The ceiling: the privacy law makes you build a system that actually deletes personal data once your stated retention period runs out or the data is no longer needed. When the two collide, the keep-it duty wins, because the delete duty has a written carve-out for complying with law and for defending legal claims.High confidence
What happens when something goes wrong?: Count three clocks, not one. First: tell the privacy regulator about a personal data breach without delay and within 72 hours of becoming aware, unless the breach carries no risk to people; if the risk to people is high you must also tell the affected individuals, with advice on what to do, without delay. Second: if you run critical information infrastructure, a significant cyber threat must be reported to the national cyber-security agency and to your own sector regulator, and silence without good reason is itself an offence. Third: if you are a bank or a telecoms operator and you suspect technology crime, you must push customer account and transaction data into a shared government-run system immediately.High confidence
What's the trap?: Five things that are not in the brochure. Children: Thailand needs a parent's consent for a child aged ten or under, and for older teenagers too unless the act is one the law lets a minor do alone — and a person is a minor in Thailand until twenty. Jail is on the table for misusing sensitive data. You owe compensation even if you were not careless, and a court can add up to double on top. A foreign company must put a named human in Thailand with unlimited authority. And the 90-day log rule catches ordinary businesses that just offer guest wi-fi.High confidence
What's about to change?: Nothing in the next twelve months looks like a new statute. What is moving is enforcement reach. The privacy regulator is opening walk-in centres in eight provinces during 2026 to cover all five regions, which means more complaints will actually get filed. The Cabinet decided on 11 August 2026 to require multi-factor login protection across government to stop leaked passwords turning into data breaches, and the ministry is pushing the same expectation across all twenty ministries. The bigger risk is not new law but switches the government already holds and can flip without warning.Medium confidence
Hardest industry wall: None found.

FranceChecked 18 August 2026

Depends on your industryWork: HighEnforcement: Aggressive

In one paragraph: France follows the European rule: data may leave, but only once the right paperwork is in place. France then adds hard walls of its own. Health records must be stored inside Europe. Online gambling records must sit on a machine in mainland France. From 1 September 2026 the invoicing platform every French business must use has to run entirely from inside Europe.
The catch: "France has no local storage rule" is true for an ordinary business and false the moment you touch health data, online gambling, electronic invoicing or a government contract involving sensitive state data. In those four areas France is among the strictest countries in Europe. Since March 2026 the health rule sits in a decree, not just a certification standard, so it now binds the customer as well as the supplier.
Does this apply to me?: Yes. France reaches a company with no office in the country. European law already applies to anyone offering goods or services to people in Europe. On top of that, France's own privacy law says its national rules apply as soon as the person concerned lives in France, even when the company is based somewhere else. There is no size or revenue threshold that lets you escape.High confidence
Can the data leave the country?: For an ordinary business, yes, with paperwork: the European transfer rules apply and nothing extra is added. But four French sectors override that. Health records must be stored inside Europe and nowhere else. Online gambling records must be archived in real time on hardware in mainland France. Electronic invoicing platforms must run their whole system from inside Europe. And sensitive state data must sit on a cloud that the French cyber agency has certified as beyond the reach of foreign authorities.High confidence
What do I have to do to send it abroad?: The model is an approved-list one, run from Brussels rather than Paris. Data may go to a country the European Commission has formally approved, or anywhere else if you sign the official standard contract and write down why you think the data will still be safe. The list of approved countries is full, not empty: it includes the United Kingdom, Japan, South Korea, Canada, Switzerland, Brazil and about a dozen others, plus American companies that have signed up to the transatlantic framework. France adds no separate national approval step.High confidence
Who enforces this — and are they actually working?: The privacy regulator is the CNIL, and it is one of the busiest in Europe. In 2025 alone it issued 83 penalties totalling about 487 million euros (roughly 530 million dollars), plus 143 formal warnings. It is still fining in 2026: 5 million euros against the national employment agency in January and 5 million against a health data company in May. Separate regulators run the sector walls, and all of them are staffed and working.High confidence
How long must I keep it, and when must I delete it?: There is a floor and a ceiling and they pull in opposite directions. You must keep accounting books and supporting documents for ten years, tax records for six, employment contracts and pay records for five, and telephone and internet subscriber identity data for five. In the other direction, European law says you must delete personal data once you no longer need it. France resolves the clash the same way most of Europe does: the legal minimum wins, but only for the specific documents the law names, and only for as long as it names.High confidence
What happens when something goes wrong?: Count the clocks, because France has at least four and they run at different speeds. Every organisation has 72 hours to tell the CNIL about a personal data breach. Telephone and internet providers have only 24 hours. Hospitals and clinics must report a serious computer security incident to their regional health agency immediately. Banks, insurers and investment firms have their own European deadlines: an initial report within 4 hours of classifying a major incident and no later than 24 hours after they notice it.High confidence
What's the trap?: Five things that are not in the summary. (1) Breaking the privacy law in France is a crime, not just a fine: sending data out of Europe unlawfully carries up to five years in prison and a 300,000 euro fine (about 330,000 dollars), and it attaches to people, not only companies. (2) A child is anyone under 15 for consent, not 13 or 16. (3) A 2023 law setting a social media age of 15 is printed in the statute book but has never come into force and cannot be enforced. (4) Handing documents to a foreign court or regulator can itself be a criminal offence in France. (5) Cookies are policed separately from the rest of privacy law, so a foreign company cannot hide behind its lead European regulator.High confidence
What's about to change?: Four dates in the next twelve months. 1 September 2026: every French business must be able to send and receive invoices through an approved platform, and those platforms must run entirely from inside Europe. Around 27 September 2026: the second phase of the health data hosting decree starts. 21 October 2026: the order forcing telephone and internet companies to keep everyone's connection records for a year expires unless the Prime Minister renews it. 12 January 2027: cloud providers across Europe must drop switching and data export fees to zero.Medium confidence
Hardest industry wall: Health and social care — Decret n° 2026-209 du 24 mars 2026 portant modification de certaines dispositions du code de la sante publique relatives a l'hebergement de donnees de sante a caractere personnel
Government — Decret n° 2026-272 du 14 avril 2026 relatif a la protection des donnees d'une sensibilite particuliere des administrations, operateurs et groupements d'interet public de l'Etat traitees par un service d'informatique en nuage fourni par un prestataire prive
All industries — Immatriculation des plateformes agreees (ex plateformes de dematerialisation partenaires) - facturation electronique
Online gaming — Article 31 de la loi n° 2010-476 du 12 mai 2010 relative a l'ouverture a la concurrence et a la regulation du secteur des jeux d'argent et de hasard en ligne

The eight framework questions answered for each selected country
Question	ThailandChecked 18 August 2026	FranceChecked 18 August 2026
The three ratings	Yes, with paperwork Work: High Enforcement: Active	Depends on your industry Work: High Enforcement: Aggressive
In one paragraph	Thailand does not make you keep personal data inside the country, but data cannot leave until you have picked and documented a legal route. The regulator never published a list of approved destination countries, so consent and written safeguards do all the work. A foreign company selling into Thailand needs a named representative living there. Getting it wrong can mean fines, double damages, and in the worst cases jail.	France follows the European rule: data may leave, but only once the right paperwork is in place. France then adds hard walls of its own. Health records must be stored inside Europe. Online gambling records must sit on a machine in mainland France. From 1 September 2026 the invoicing platform every French business must use has to run entirely from inside Europe.
The catch	The permissive headline is about residency only. The burden is high and the pain is elsewhere: a person in Thailand who answers for you personally, parental consent for anyone under twenty in many cases, 90-day traffic logs that catch any business offering guest wi-fi, compensation owed even when you were not careless, and a technology-crime regime that forces banks and telecoms companies to hand customer data into a government-run exchange. Payments, government workloads and digital platforms each add their own regulator gate on top.	"France has no local storage rule" is true for an ordinary business and false the moment you touch health data, online gambling, electronic invoicing or a government contract involving sensitive state data. In those four areas France is among the strictest countries in Europe. Since March 2026 the health rule sits in a decree, not just a certification standard, so it now binds the customer as well as the supplier.
Does this apply to me?	Yes. The privacy law reaches a company with no office in Thailand if it offers goods or services to people who are in Thailand, or if it tracks what those people do. Payment is irrelevant — a free service counts. There is no revenue or headcount floor to fall below. A foreign company caught this way must appoint, in writing, a representative who is physically in Thailand and who can be held answerable with no cap on liability.High confidence	Yes. France reaches a company with no office in the country. European law already applies to anyone offering goods or services to people in Europe. On top of that, France's own privacy law says its national rules apply as soon as the person concerned lives in France, even when the company is based somewhere else. There is no size or revenue threshold that lets you escape.High confidence
Can the data leave the country?	Yes, in most cases. Thailand does not make companies keep a copy of personal data inside the country. But data cannot simply leave: you must first have a legal route, and the regulator has never published a list of approved destination countries, so the 'this country is safe enough' route is unusable in practice. Everyone falls back on informed consent, contract necessity, approved group-wide rules, or their own written safeguards. Several industries add a second gate on top, described below.High confidence	For an ordinary business, yes, with paperwork: the European transfer rules apply and nothing extra is added. But four French sectors override that. Health records must be stored inside Europe and nowhere else. Online gambling records must be archived in real time on hardware in mainland France. Electronic invoicing platforms must run their whole system from inside Europe. And sensitive state data must sit on a cloud that the French cyber agency has certified as beyond the reach of foreign authorities.High confidence
What do I have to do to send it abroad?	There is no permission slip to apply for and no banned-country list. You pick a route and document it before the data moves. The routes are: the destination is judged to have good enough protection; one of six statutory exceptions such as informed consent; group-wide rules certified by the regulator; or your own written safeguards that a person in Thailand could actually enforce. The 'good enough country' route is dead on arrival because the regulator has published no approved list, so in practice the safeguards route and consent do all the work.Medium confidence	The model is an approved-list one, run from Brussels rather than Paris. Data may go to a country the European Commission has formally approved, or anywhere else if you sign the official standard contract and write down why you think the data will still be safe. The list of approved countries is full, not empty: it includes the United Kingdom, Japan, South Korea, Canada, Switzerland, Brazil and about a dozen others, plus American companies that have signed up to the transatlantic framework. France adds no separate national approval step.High confidence
Who enforces this — and are they actually working?	The Office of the Personal Data Protection Committee, usually shortened to PDPC, sits under the Ministry of Digital Economy and Society. It is real and staffed: it has a serving Secretary-General, it runs walk-in complaint centres in five provinces and opened another in Ubon Ratchathani on 17 August 2026, and it is executing Cabinet-level instructions on data breaches. Complaints are decided by an Expert Committee that can order you to stop, order you to fix things, and impose fines itself. Other regulators run their own lanes: the cyber-security agency for critical infrastructure, the central bank for payments, and the electronic transactions agency for digital platforms.Medium confidence	The privacy regulator is the CNIL, and it is one of the busiest in Europe. In 2025 alone it issued 83 penalties totalling about 487 million euros (roughly 530 million dollars), plus 143 formal warnings. It is still fining in 2026: 5 million euros against the national employment agency in January and 5 million against a health data company in May. Separate regulators run the sector walls, and all of them are staffed and working.High confidence
How long must I keep it, and when must I delete it?	Thailand pushes in both directions at once. The floor: anyone who provides a computer or internet service to other people must keep traffic logs for at least 90 days, and an official can order that stretched to as much as two years. The ceiling: the privacy law makes you build a system that actually deletes personal data once your stated retention period runs out or the data is no longer needed. When the two collide, the keep-it duty wins, because the delete duty has a written carve-out for complying with law and for defending legal claims.High confidence	There is a floor and a ceiling and they pull in opposite directions. You must keep accounting books and supporting documents for ten years, tax records for six, employment contracts and pay records for five, and telephone and internet subscriber identity data for five. In the other direction, European law says you must delete personal data once you no longer need it. France resolves the clash the same way most of Europe does: the legal minimum wins, but only for the specific documents the law names, and only for as long as it names.High confidence
What happens when something goes wrong?	Count three clocks, not one. First: tell the privacy regulator about a personal data breach without delay and within 72 hours of becoming aware, unless the breach carries no risk to people; if the risk to people is high you must also tell the affected individuals, with advice on what to do, without delay. Second: if you run critical information infrastructure, a significant cyber threat must be reported to the national cyber-security agency and to your own sector regulator, and silence without good reason is itself an offence. Third: if you are a bank or a telecoms operator and you suspect technology crime, you must push customer account and transaction data into a shared government-run system immediately.High confidence	Count the clocks, because France has at least four and they run at different speeds. Every organisation has 72 hours to tell the CNIL about a personal data breach. Telephone and internet providers have only 24 hours. Hospitals and clinics must report a serious computer security incident to their regional health agency immediately. Banks, insurers and investment firms have their own European deadlines: an initial report within 4 hours of classifying a major incident and no later than 24 hours after they notice it.High confidence
What's the trap?	Five things that are not in the brochure. Children: Thailand needs a parent's consent for a child aged ten or under, and for older teenagers too unless the act is one the law lets a minor do alone — and a person is a minor in Thailand until twenty. Jail is on the table for misusing sensitive data. You owe compensation even if you were not careless, and a court can add up to double on top. A foreign company must put a named human in Thailand with unlimited authority. And the 90-day log rule catches ordinary businesses that just offer guest wi-fi.High confidence	Five things that are not in the summary. (1) Breaking the privacy law in France is a crime, not just a fine: sending data out of Europe unlawfully carries up to five years in prison and a 300,000 euro fine (about 330,000 dollars), and it attaches to people, not only companies. (2) A child is anyone under 15 for consent, not 13 or 16. (3) A 2023 law setting a social media age of 15 is printed in the statute book but has never come into force and cannot be enforced. (4) Handing documents to a foreign court or regulator can itself be a criminal offence in France. (5) Cookies are policed separately from the rest of privacy law, so a foreign company cannot hide behind its lead European regulator.High confidence
What's about to change?	Nothing in the next twelve months looks like a new statute. What is moving is enforcement reach. The privacy regulator is opening walk-in centres in eight provinces during 2026 to cover all five regions, which means more complaints will actually get filed. The Cabinet decided on 11 August 2026 to require multi-factor login protection across government to stop leaked passwords turning into data breaches, and the ministry is pushing the same expectation across all twenty ministries. The bigger risk is not new law but switches the government already holds and can flip without warning.Medium confidence	Four dates in the next twelve months. 1 September 2026: every French business must be able to send and receive invoices through an approved platform, and those platforms must run entirely from inside Europe. Around 27 September 2026: the second phase of the health data hosting decree starts. 21 October 2026: the order forcing telephone and internet companies to keep everyone's connection records for a year expires unless the Prime Minister renews it. 12 January 2027: cloud providers across Europe must drop switching and data export fees to zero.Medium confidence
Hardest industry wall	None found.	Health and social care — Decret n° 2026-209 du 24 mars 2026 portant modification de certaines dispositions du code de la sante publique relatives a l'hebergement de donnees de sante a caractere personnel Government — Decret n° 2026-272 du 14 avril 2026 relatif a la protection des donnees d'une sensibilite particuliere des administrations, operateurs et groupements d'interet public de l'Etat traitees par un service d'informatique en nuage fourni par un prestataire prive All industries — Immatriculation des plateformes agreees (ex plateformes de dematerialisation partenaires) - facturation electronique Online gaming — Article 31 de la loi n° 2010-476 du 12 mai 2010 relative a l'ouverture a la concurrence et a la regulation du secteur des jeux d'argent et de hasard en ligne