NHS warns patients they could lose text alerts as GDPR deluge continues

Health service joins UK firms in rushing to comply with new data protection rules

The National Health Service is texting patients to warn they could lose alerts about hospital and doctor appointments, joining the deluge of more than 1bn "GDPR" messages currently hitting personal inboxes to meet an EU deadline this week.

GDPR, which stands for General Data Protection Regulation, has been described as the biggest overhaul of online privacy since the birth of the internet, and comes into force on Friday May 25. It gives all EU citizens the right to know what data is stored on them and to have it deleted, plus protect them from privacy and data breaches. If companies fail to comply, they can be hit with fines of up to a20m (17.5m) or 4% of global turnover.