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![172 Countries Now Have a Privacy Policy Law [2026 Study]](/_astro/privacy-policy-laws-by-country-2026.zNFTCbK3_1B5UKz.webp)
172 countries and self-governing territories now have a comprehensive data protection law that obligates businesses to disclose a privacy policy, according to David Banisar's Data Protection Update and Map, 2026 edition (January 26, 2026). See adoption by tracker, the fastest growth years, and which major economies still have no such law.
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About 1.03 billion people, 12.6% of the world's population, live in a country the European Commission has formally certified as providing GDPR-equivalent data protection as of 2026. See the country-by-country breakdown, how Gartner's 2020 forecast compares, and why a broader definition pushes the total toward half the world.
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172 countries now have a national data privacy law, according to Graham Greenleaf's Global Data Privacy Laws 2025 tables, up from 89 a decade earlier. See the country-by-country breakdown, regional coverage rates, and how many laws follow the GDPR model.
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