The European Union is proposing a new data protection rule – the “right to be forgotten”.

The idea is that individuals would be able to insist that data about themselves must be deleted unless it was being kept for a legitimate purpose.

I think this is a potentially great antidote to people doing daft things on the internet and not being able to escape them. It would also be useful for escaping the clutches of annoying marketing companies. This week I’ve had an appalling time stopping one company from repeatedly posting things to my dead mother. This proposal would add even greater weight to be treated with dignity when fixing such things.

The other important element would be a requirement to notifiy people within 24hours if a company loses your data, has it stolen or has it hacked. With the “right to be forgotten” it would mean only live data was available to be lost, stolen or hacked and protect many people whose data isnt actually relevant to an organisation anymore but has been kept.

Businesses are concerned at the requirement for a statutory Data Protection Officer but by harmonising these rules across European the Commission estimates a total saving of £1.9bn a year across Europe. It would also mean people could be more relaxed about providing data which could further boost internet use and the depth of internet use.

Fingers crossed these new consumer rights get approved.