Exit Explains: What the Law Says On the Sharing of Personal Information

During this week, a database with the data of more than 910,000 voters of the country was made public. Its existence was revealed by Lapsi.al who have since found themselves forced to hand over the information, at risk of revealing sources, to SPAK.

The data provided included their ID number, name, fathers name, surname, date of birth, voting center, place of birth, residence code, list number, phone number, whether they are an emigrant and if so, which country, whether they are likely to vote for the Socialist Party, birthplace, employer, and Patron. The data is suspected to have been taken from the Civil Registry and given to the Socialist Party for use in the election campaign.

The publication of personal data by the media and subsequent dissemination to all citizens is a violation of the right to privacy, provided by the Constitution and the Convention on Human Rights, with the exception of when its publication is in the public interest.

So, according to the laws of Albania, the media can publish your data when it manages to prove that non-publication of this data violates freedom of expression.

The storage, prohibition, and publication of personal data is determined by:

The Convention on Human Rights provides that personal data may be published only in the public interest.

The Constitution, Article 35, which stipulates that no one may be obliged to make public personal data and “the collection, use, and disclosure of data about a person are done with his consent, except in cases provided by law.”

Law “On personal data”, which prohibits the publication of personal data without the consent of the person or when there is no public interest. This law provides that data may be processed – collected, amended or transferred – for journalistic purposes only if the prohibition on processing it violates freedom of expression.

Fjalë kyçe:   Albania, data leak, data privacy, Tirana