Dhaka, Oct. 25 -- The government has formally clarified that the newly finalised Personal Data Protection Ordinance (PDPO) does not impose a blanket obligation to store all personal data within Bangladesh, rebutting claims made in a recent newspaper article.

The special assistant to the Chief Adviser on posts, telecommunications and ICT, Faiz Ahmad Taiyeb, stated in an open letter to the country's digital community on Friday that the claim of compulsory, hundred per cent data localisation was "entirely incorrect" and based on an "outdated draft" prepared under a previous administration.

The letter explains that Bangladesh has adopted a cloud-first policy rather than a localisation-first model, allowing data to be stored and processed ab...