The second category has been further specified in Article 5 of the Cabinet Order. Read in conjunction with Article 2(7) of the APPI, it exempts from the scope of the notion of retained personal data, and thus from the individual rights under the APPI, those personal data that are "set to be deleted" within a period of six months. The PPC has explained that this exemption aims at incentivising business operators to retain and process data for the shortest period possible. However, this would mean that EU data subjects would not be able to benefit from important rights for no other reason than the duration of the retention of their data by the concerned business operator.

In order to address this situation, Supplementary Rule (2) requires that personal data transferred from the European Union "be handled as retained personal data within the meaning of Article 2, paragraph 7 of the Act, irrespective of the period within which it is set to be deleted". Hence, the retention period will have no bearing on the rights afforded to EU data subjects.

Data subjects should be informed of the main features of the processing of their personal data.

Third, in addition to civil law (tort) remedies, a data subject may file a complaint with a public prosecutor or judicial police official with respect to APPI violations that can lead to criminal sanctions. Chapter VII of the APPI contains a number of penal provisions. The most important one (Article 84) relates to non-compliance by the PIHBO with PPC orders pursuant to Article 42(2) and (3). If a business operator fails to comply with an order issued by the PPC, the PPC Chair (as well as any other government official) (66) may forward the case to the public prosecutor or judicial police official and in that way trigger the opening of a criminal procedure. The penalty for the violation of a PPC order is imprisonment with labour for up to six months or a fine of up to 300 000 yen. Other provisions of the APPI providing for sanctions in case of APPI violations affecting the rights and interests of data subjects include Article 83 of the APPI (regarding the "providing or using by stealth" of a personal information database "for the purpose of seeking […] illegal profits") and Article 88(i) of the APPI (regarding the failure by a third party to correctly inform the PIHBO when the latter receives personal data in accordance with Article 26(1) of the APPI, in particular on the details of the third party's own, prior acquisition of such data). The applicable penalties for such violations of the APPI are, respectively, imprisonment with work for up to one year or a fine of up to 500 000 yen (in case of Article 83) or an administrative fine of up to 100 000 yen (in case of Article 88(i)). While the threat of a criminal sanction is already likely to have a strong deterrent effect on the business management that directs the PIHBO's processing operations as well as on the individuals handling the data, Article 87 of the APPI clarifies that when a representative, employee or other worker of a corporate body has committed a violation pursuant to Articles 83 to 85 of the APPI, "the actor shall be punished and a fine set forth in the respective Articles shall be imposed on the said corporate body". In this case, both the employee and the company can be imposed sanctions up to the full maximum amount.

Moreover, in order to allow the Commission to effectively carry out its monitoring function, the Member States should inform the Commission about any relevant action undertaken by the national data protection authorities ("DPAs"), in particular regarding queries or complaints by EU data subjects concerning the transfer of personal data from the European Union to business operators in Japan. The Commission should also be informed about any indications that the actions of Japanese public authorities responsible for the prevention, investigation, detection or prosecution of criminal offences, or for national security, including any oversight bodies, do not ensure the required level of protection.

On duly justified grounds of urgency, such as a risk of serious infringment of data subjects’ rights, the Commission should consider adopting a decision to suspend or repeal this Decision that should apply immediately, pursuant to Article 93(3) of Regulation (EU) 2016/679 in conjunction with Article 8 of Regulation (EU) No 182/2011 of the European Parliament and of the Council (153).