Direct Marketing Commission - Enforcing Higher Industry Standards

George Kidd, Chief Commissioner has received this year’s Roll of Honour award from the DMA for his services to the direct marketing industry.

George Kidd said: “I was surprised and delighted to be added to the Roll of Honour. I see it as recognition of the work of the Commission as a team and of the ways in which the DMA has focused on the user experience of direct marketing, investing hugely in an amazing new Code that deals with the big picture issues of privacy, honesty, taking responsibility for services and conduct and diligence in managing data. In less than ten pages the Code sets standards we can all understand, that few could debate and that we can all follow. There are lessons here for lawmakers: less is more!

Please here see link to DMA website.

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A data journey is the path travelled by a consumer’s data throughout its use. We think that visualising the data journey allows us to see how data has moved from one step to another and we can signpost different clauses or possible breaches at each step identifying problems.  Please see here for an explanation of this process and an example of a case that we investigated.

George Kidd, Chief Commissioner said: “There is a need in this day and age to look beyond the behaviour of one party that is complained about and understand the whole process. With food it might be how produce gets from the field to the plate. In our case, it is a data journey. Only by understanding how someone’s data is obtained, what they understand of that and then how the data is added to, bundled and sold on, can we understand why and when we get calls, e-mails and other marketing messages from unexpected sources.”

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The Commission recently conducted adjudications on two companies which were the subject of extensive coverage in the Daily Mail earlier this year. The allegations in the newspaper were serious and the Commission looked carefully at the conduct of the two businesses which were allegedly sharing sensitive data inappropriately and without adequate consent.

George Kidd, Chief Commissioner said: “These key investigations highlighted the importance of transparency when buying and selling data, in particular, data which is perceived to be sensitive. Businesses need to do their due diligence to assure themselves that the data they are buying is properly sourced and permissioned before they pass it on to other parties. When data is bought and sold across an extended supply chain and it is not clear as to the source or origin of that data, this will result in the public frustrations which we have seen from consumers and which have been highlighted in recent press coverage”.

Please see here for links to our two adjudication summaries – B2C Data and Data Bubble.

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