ANPD Fines and Penalties: An Updated Overview

This page is a translation of the original Portuguese text, provided for convenience. It deals with Brazilian law. If there is any discrepancy, the Portuguese version prevails. Read the original in Portuguese

The ANPD (Brazil’s National Data Protection Authority) has already imposed sanctions ranging from warnings to multimillion-real fines, and companies that neglect data protection face growing risks in 2026.

The ANPD’s Sanctioning Power and the Evolution of Enforcement

Since Brazil’s General Data Protection Law (LGPD), Law No. 13.709/2018, took effect, the ANPD has gone through a period of institutional maturing that has culminated in the real exercise of its power to sanction. In the first years under the LGPD, the agency’s approach was mainly educational, built around guidance documents, resolutions, and technical notes. That changed substantially in 2023, when the first administrative sanctions were actually imposed, signaling to the market that the adjustment period was over.

The sanctions framework set out in Articles 52 to 54 of the LGPD gives the ANPD a wide range of measures, from a simple warning to a fine of up to 2% of the revenue of a legal entity governed by private law, a group, or a conglomerate in Brazil, capped at R$ 50 million per infraction. Besides monetary fines, the authority may order the blocking or deletion of the personal data involved in the infraction, partial suspension of the operation of the database, and even a partial or total ban on activities related to data processing.

Resolution CD/ANPD No. 4/2023, which approved the Regulation on Penalty Calculation and Application of Administrative Sanctions, was a landmark in this process. The regulation set objective criteria for classifying infractions (minor, moderate, or serious), parameters for calculating the base amount of fines, and aggravating and mitigating circumstances. An effective privacy governance program, for example, is expressly recognized as a mitigating factor when the penalty is calculated.

Landmark Cases and Enforcement Precedents

The first sanctioning administrative proceeding concluded by the ANPD involved a small telecommunications company, which received a warning and an order to come into compliance because of failures in processing personal data. Although the sanction was mild, the case set important procedural precedents on how the authority conducts its enforcement proceedings, from the preliminary investigation through the final decision of the Board of Directors.

The sanctioning proceedings that followed show a pattern: the ANPD has focused on certain recurring categories of infractions. These include processing without a legal basis, lack of transparency toward the data subject, failure to keep a record of processing operations (known as the ROPA, provided for in Article 37 of the LGPD), deficient responses to security incidents, and failure to report incidents to the authority and to the affected data subjects. The ANPD has also paid special attention to data processing by public bodies. Although those bodies are not subject to monetary fines, they can receive warnings, compliance orders, and sanctions requiring public disclosure of the infraction.

An effective privacy governance program is not just good corporate practice. The ANPD expressly recognizes it as a mitigating factor when calculating sanctions.

The ANPD’s enforcement has concentrated on sectors that process large volumes of personal data, such as health care, telecommunications, education, and financial services. The authority maintains a channel for complaints and petitions from data subjects, which serves as an important source of information for opening proceedings on its own initiative. Cooperation with other bodies (such as the Public Prosecutor’s Office, the Procons (state consumer protection agencies), and CADE (Brazil’s antitrust authority)) has also become increasingly frequent, widening the reach of enforcement.

Financial and Reputational Impacts on Organizations

The R$ 50 million cap per infraction is often cited, but the impact of an ANPD sanction goes well beyond the amount of the fine. Public disclosure of the infraction, which Article 52, item IV, of the LGPD provides for as a standalone sanction, can cause severe reputational harm, especially in sectors where consumer trust is a decisive competitive factor. A company publicly identified as a violator of data protection law loses credibility in the market, runs into difficulties in due diligence reviews conducted by business partners and investors, and may see customers move to more diligent competitors.

In mergers and acquisitions, LGPD compliance has become a mandatory item in due diligence. Pending sanctioning proceedings, sanctions already imposed, or even the lack of a structured privacy program can significantly affect the valuation of a target company. Investors and buyers treat data protection regulatory risk as a relevant contingent liability, one that can change the terms of a transaction or, in extreme cases, make it unworkable.

ANPD sanctions also have a multiplier effect in court. Sanctioning decisions are used as support in individual and class actions brought by data subjects seeking compensation for moral and material damages caused by irregular processing. Brazilian courts have increasingly recognized the civil liability of processing agents, especially where there is evidence of negligence in adopting adequate security measures.

Compliance Strategies and Risk Mitigation

Given this landscape, adopting a robust privacy governance program is no longer a competitive advantage. It has become an operational necessity. Article 50 of the LGPD provides that controllers and processors may establish rules of good practice and governance setting conditions for organization, operating regime, procedures (including complaints and petitions from data subjects), security standards, technical standards, specific obligations, and internal mechanisms for supervision and risk mitigation.

Organizations should prioritize the following core measures: appointing a qualified Data Protection Officer (Encarregado, or DPO) with functional autonomy; preparing and keeping up to date the Record of Processing Operations (ROPA); putting in place a formal process for Data Protection Impact Assessments (RIPD) for high-risk operations; creating a security incident response procedure with defined deadlines and a trained team; and setting up an effective channel for handling the data subject rights provided for in Article 18 of the LGPD.

It is worth noting that the ANPD has given weight in its decisions to a processing agent’s good faith. Organizations that suffered an incident but can show they had adopted reasonable preventive measures, notified the authority and the data subjects promptly, and carried out corrective actions tend to receive milder sanctions. On the other hand, repeat offenses, obstruction of enforcement, and a complete absence of compliance measures are treated as aggravating factors when the penalty is calculated.

Third-party management (vendors) also deserves special attention. Article 39 of the LGPD establishes that the processor must carry out processing according to the instructions given by the controller. Contracts without data protection clauses, no prior due diligence on suppliers’ privacy practices, and no contractual audit mechanisms are vulnerabilities that can make the controller jointly and severally liable for failures committed by the processor.

Outlook for 2026 and Regulatory Trends

The year 2026 marks a period of consolidation for the ANPD’s sanctioning activity. The authority has expanded its technical staff, improved its enforcement tools, and stepped up international cooperation with data protection authorities in other countries, especially through the Ibero-American Data Protection Network and the Global Privacy Assembly.

Regulation of pending topics (such as international data transfers, artificial intelligence, and the processing of data of children and adolescents) is likely to broaden the scope of enforcement and, as a result, of sanctions. The convergence between the LGPD and sector-specific regulatory frameworks (such as the Central Bank’s Open Finance rules and the ANS (National Supplementary Health Agency) rules on health data) also creates new layers of obligations that call for extra attention from processing agents.

The global trend toward tougher sanctions for privacy violations (notably the billion-dollar fines imposed by European authorities under the GDPR) is an indication of the path the ANPD is likely to follow as its institutional structure consolidates. Organizations that put off investing in compliance are betting against an irreversible regulatory trend and taking on risks that could jeopardize not only their finances but their very ability to keep operating.

As informações deste artigo são de caráter informativo e não substituem consulta jurídica individualizada. Cada caso possui particularidades que exigem análise específica.