The French data protection authority, the CNIL, has unveiled its 2014 programme for inspections, with a goal of carrying out 550 inspections—at an increase of 33 percent from 2013.

Bird & Bird has compiled the details, noting that of the inspections targeted for this year, some 350 are expected to be conducted onsite with about 200 to be online.

“This year's programme confirms CNIL's strong intent to use its new power to conduct remote investigations,” Bird & Bird’s Gabriel Voisin told The Privacy Advisor. “This will be of particular use to assess the level of cookie compliance of companies or evaluate online data breaches.”

The CNIL has highlighted specific priority areas for 2014. Among them, Bird & Bird reports, are online dating services “as players in this sector collect a large amount of personal data, including sensitive personal data; e.g., sexual orientations, religious belief. According to the CNIL, controlling this area will enable the authority to identify the players and practices in this sector. Third-party applications linked to these dating platforms will also be under scrutiny.”

Other priorities include online payments, electronic communication services’ methods for dealing with personal data breaches, CCTV and cookie compliance.

“In the offline world,” Voisin said, “the CNIL confirms its persistent interest for CCTV compliance with 25 percent of its onsite inspections dedicated to this issue.”

The CNIL also plans to “continue the work undertaken in 2013 in relation to international cooperation between data protection authorities, particularly through the second stage of Sweep Day, an operation which required around 20 data protection authorities to analyse the information notices of around 2,000 websites in 2013. This year, the theme of this operation will focus on mobile privacy.”

The full Bird & Bird report on the CNIL’s 2014 programme can be accessed here.