The POPI Act / Sections / Section 36
Section 36
General
Chapter 4 · Exemptions
Processing of personal information is not in breach of a condition for the processing of such information if the— (a) Regulator grants an exemption in terms of section 37; or (b) processing is in accordance with section 38.
Source: justice.gov.za — Protection of Personal Information Act 4 of 2013 (official PDF) — cross-checked verbatim before publishing.
Beyond the text
What this means for your estate
- This is the umbrella statement for the whole chapter — there are exactly two lawful routes to vary from a Condition otherwise: a case-by-case Regulator exemption (s.37) or the specific statutory carve-out for certain functions (s.38). There's no general “reasonable exception” beyond those two.
Relevant tool
In practice, most estates never need either route — PopiGuard's compliance programme is built to work within the standard eight conditions rather than relying on an exemption.