The Advisory Guidelines for Key Concepts elaborate on and provide illustrations for the key obligations in the PDPA and interpretation of key terms in the PDPA. These assist in organisations and individuals’ general understanding of the PDPA.

The full document is available here. The annexes are available here: Annex A, Annex B and Annex C.

Chapters Listing

Chapters 1 - 2: Introduction and Overview
Chapters 3 - 9: Important Terms Used in the PDPA
Chapter 10: Overview of the Data Protection Provisions
Chapter 11: Applicability to Inbound Data Transfers
Chapter 12: The Consent Obligation
Chapter 13: The Purpose Limitation Obligation
Chapter 14: The Notification Obligation
Chapter 15: The Access and Correction Obligations
Chapter 16: The Accuracy Obligation
Chapter 17: The Protection Obligation
Chapter 18: The Retention Limitation Obligation
Chapter 19: The Transfer Limitation Obligation
Chapter 20: The Data Breach Notification Obligation
Chapter 21: The Accountability Obligation
Chapters 22 - 23: Offences affecting personal data and anonymised information
Chapters 24 - 26: Other Rights, Obligations and Uses
Annex A: Framework for the Collection, Use and Disclosure of Personal Data
Annex B: Assessment Checklist for Deemed Consent by Notification
Annex C: Assessment Checklist for Legitimate Interests Exception

Revisions to Advisory Guidelines

As of 29 April 2026, the section on "Conditions for transfer of personal data overseas" has been updated to include references to the Global Cross-Border Privacy Rules System, and the Global Privacy Recognition for Processors System.