Highly sensitive personal data is processed during the letting process. Handling this data carelessly can threaten a landlord’s very existence. This is shown by the recent multi-million fine imposed on a listed housing company. So what do you need to bear in mind?
The greatest risk of fines comes from so-called data graveyards. These arise when data on prospective tenants and tenants is not deleted in time or can no longer be assigned at all. Receiving and processing prospective tenants’ data and documents by email or online form is particularly dangerous. Even if the data is subsequently processed in letting software with built-in deletion routines, landlords are not protected against individual employees storing data in parallel systems such as email programs. In addition, data may not be assigned correctly in the letting software. This creates data graveyards that management cannot control, which represent a significant risk of fines from the supervisory authorities.
The fine of €14.5 million imposed in November on one of Germany’s largest housing companies shows just how seriously the supervisory authorities take the protection of prospective tenants’ and tenants’ data. The authority justified the fine on the grounds that personal data had been stored for years even though it no longer served the original purpose for which it was collected. The size of the fine can also be seen as a warning to the housing industry to handle personal data with care.
Prospective tenants keep control of their data
The data trustee structure of Immomio’s letting platform is an effective way for landlords to protect themselves against data graveyards and avoid fines. After all, it is easier to prevent data from accumulating in the first place than to remove these data collections again with complex and error-prone deletion routines. With Immomio, sensitive prospective tenant data can only be entered and managed by the prospective tenants themselves in a protected area. This means prospective tenants always retain full control over their data. Throughout the letting process, prospective tenants can decide for themselves whether the landlord may access their data. Deleting their own data also remains in the hands of the prospective tenants. It is impossible for data to be received by email or for staff to store and process sensitive data in local systems.
Immomio’s letting platform thus sets new standards in data protection. This has also been confirmed by an independent data protection report by GdW Revisions AG, which certifies that Immomio has a “high level of data protection” and is “unobjectionable under data protection law”.