Fidias Panayiotou’s Direct Democracy app and online platform ‘Agora’ has been fined €6,000 for personal data breaches, commissioner Maria Christofidou announced on Wednesday.

The decision to impose an administrative fine was made public on Tuesday as “a reasonable and proportionate” penalty.

Panayiotou, who is listed as the “data controller”, had violated regulation provisions by not fulfilling the authority’s demand to temporarily suspend the operations of the platform, which collected and processed personal data, and for his attitude towards the authority.

These actions and omissions either obstructed or delayed the in-depth investigation of the case, the personal data commissioner said.

Christofidou said the authority had repeatedly sent clear demands for the investigation of personal data issues, to which Panayiotou did not adequately reply.

Panayiotou’s compliance, the commissioner said, was “fragmentary, incomplete and did not respond to the whole of the authority’s demand”.

Furthermore, Panayiotou, as the data controller, should have fully, clearly and substantively replied in a timely manner, and provided clear, complete and consistent information, in order to allow the authority to carry out its supervisory duties.

The commissioner said Panayiotou did not temporarily suspend the app, as he was requested to do, and did not provide full and clear feedback.

The authority also took into account Panayiotou’s public remarks about not suspending the app and/or online platform, behaviour which was considered to back the lack of will to comply and cooperate.