Your Rights

Your Rights Regarding Personal Data Processing

When you answer a survey at a store or start using a new service on the internet, you are often asked to enter your name, email address, mobile phone number and other personal information into a registration form.

Do you get the feeling that you are slowly losing control over your data? Or maybe you are concerned when you hear cases of personal data leaks reported on the news?

For example...

• ・You forgot the date you registered for a service you started using. Where is that data?
• ・The promotion campaign you entered three months ago has ended, but will your address and other information be deleted?
• ・You have the feeling that a company has more data about you than you are aware. How can you check the data they have on you?

Thanks to data protection laws, you have rights and are entitled to receive certain information. Let’s examine those rights and see how they can clarify your concerns.

Your rights

Your rights depend on the country or region you live in and where the service you use is located. Each data protection law has different privacy rights, so it’s essential that you carefully check privacy policies to see what applies in each case, or get in touch with the services you use to ask for more information.

Broadly speaking, the following rights usually apply:

Right to access or request disclosure of personal data

You can ask a business what data it has about you. This can help you understand clearly if you feel comfortable with someone else having this information about you. Depending on the applicable law, a company will have to provide you with all the personal data they handle about you. The definition of "personal data" is different worldwide: In some countries, this will include detailed information such as logs, browsing and shopping history. In other countries, the request could be limited to only your profile information.

Right to correction of personal data

You can ask a company to correct the personal data it has about you. This can be important when your information is no longer accurate. For example, if you move to another place, you will want to update your address to ensure that you receive your packages at your new address.

Right to deletion of personal data

You can request a company to delete your personal data for the services you used. Sometimes this is referred to as the "right to be forgotten." Maybe you uploaded a picture long ago and want to ensure that it is deleted and no longer visible to other users. Or you stopped using a service and want to make sure that your data is no longer kept. In those cases, you can ask for your data to be deleted.

Companies are required to delete the data you want deleted, but sometimes there are legal requirements that don’t allow for this. For example, a company must record its sales transactions to fulfill tax obligations or respond to user claims. Imagine if a customer claimed that a product was not delivered but has been paid for, two years after purchase. In such a case, the company would need to be able to defend that claim and provide the data necessary to show that the product was actually delivered. After a certain time, usually between 6-10 years, depending on the legal requirements, this data will have to be deleted.

In Japan, there are certain conditions for deleting data. For example, if you receive a direct mail promoting products of another company, and the terms of use state that your information would not be used for any purpose other than the operation of the campaign for which you applied, you may request that the information be deleted because the use of your information exceeds the scope of the purpose for which you provided the data. Also, although it should never happen, if your information has been leaked, this is a case where you can ask your data to be deleted.

Always check the service’s privacy policy for your specific situation.

Right to object/consent

For specific use cases, you have a right to object to the use of data, or you can consent to whether you allow certain data to be processed for a specific purpose. This depends a lot on the country you reside in, but for example, in the European Union, you can consent to the use of cookies. If you disagree, no cookies will be set. Learn more about cookies here: https://global.rakuten.com/corp/privacy/understand/cookie/

Usually, you can object to email marketing as well. Some countries might offer you the option to consent. Make sure you check carefully at sign-up whether you want to agree to email marketing. Even if you agree at first but change your mind afterwards, you can unsubscribe later to stop receiving emails.

It’s important to remember that you have rights and can choose how much of your data is being processed by a company.