The United States has a myriad of regulations focused on specific types of data, such as healthcare and financial, but lacks an overall comprehensive privacy law on the national level. The European Union, the Asian- Pacific Economic Cooperation, and Russia all have national privacy protections and regulations for the handling the PII data of their citizens.

Patents protect processes (as well as inventions, new plantlife, and decorative patterns). The other answers listed are answers to other questions.

Explanation/Reference:
Explanation:
Adopted in 1995, Directive 95/46 EC establishes strong data protection and policy requirements, including the declaring of data privacy to be a human right. It establishes that an individual has the right to be notified when their personal data is being access or processed, that it only will ever be accessed for legitimate purposes, and that data will only be accessed to the exact extent it needs to be for the particular process or request.