Article 29 Working Party
The Article 29 Data Protection Working Party Article 29 Data Protection Working Party , was an independent advisory body to the European Commission on data protection issues .
The group was set up on the basis of Article 29 of Directive 95/46 / EC (Data Protection Directive) of October 24, 1995. Its official name was Group for the Protection of Individuals with the Processing of Personal Data .
When the General Data Protection Regulation came into force , the Article 29 data protection group was replaced by the European Data Protection Board.
tasks
The tasks of the data protection group were set out in Article 30 of the European Data Protection Directive and Article 15 of the Data Protection Directive for Electronic Communications . After that, the group primarily had an advisory role. However, it was also able to issue recommendations and statements of its own accord on all issues relating to the protection of individuals when processing personal data in the European Community. The two data protection guidelines in particular were the benchmarks for the audit.
In addition to its advisory function, the Article 29 data protection group also had the task of participating in the development and implementation of data protection regulations in the member states of the European Union.
Since it was founded, the group had commented on various data protection issues, such as video surveillance , e-government , unsolicited e-mail advertising , the use of biometric procedures , employee data protection, data transfer to third countries outside the EU and data protection on the Internet .
The opinions of the group were not binding. In 2003, for example, the group raised concerns about the proposed transmission of passenger data by airlines to US authorities . Nevertheless, in 2004 the Commission of the European Union decided to conclude an agreement for the transmission of this data to the Department of Homeland Security .
In 2005 the group raised concerns about the legality of the proposed data retention directive . Regardless of this, the EU Parliament passed the controversial directive on December 14, 2005.
Status and composition
The Article 29 Group was independent from the EU institutions and bodies. It made its decisions according to the majority principle.
The group consisted of one representative each from the respective national data protection authorities, the European Data Protection Supervisor and one - non-voting - representative of the European Commission . It usually met five times a year for two-day meetings at its official seat in Brussels.
The representative of the data protection authorities of the Federal Republic of Germany is the current federal commissioner for data protection and freedom of information Andrea Voßhoff , for Austria the head of the data protection authority Andrea Jelinek. The last chairperson of the Article 29 group (from February 2014) was Isabelle Falque-Pierrotin, succeeding Jacob Kohnstamm . Ventsislav Karadjov and Antonello Soro were the vice-chairs. The term of office of the chairman and the deputy was two years. One re-election was permitted.
The data protection group was assisted by a secretariat based at the European Commission's Directorate-General for Justice in Brussels . In particular, the secretariat acts as a central coordination point.
Replacement by the European Data Protection Board
When the General Data Protection Regulation came into force , the Article 29 data protection group was replaced by the European Data Protection Committee to be set up on the basis of Article 68 GDPR .
Due to the different composition of the staff, it is not certain that the data protection committee will adopt the statements of its legal predecessor and convert the working papers of the Art. 29 group, which already refer to the GDPR, into binding "guidelines", "resolutions" or " Recommendations "of the data protection committee, which the data protection committee is commissioned to create in accordance with Art. 70 GDPR. In this respect, the resilience or sustainability of the statements in the more recent working papers of the Article 29 data protection group is unclear.
literature
- Peter Schaar: The cooperation of the data protection supervisory authorities using the example of the Article 29 group. In: Datenschutz Nachrichten 1/2006, pp. 7–9.
- The European Data Protection Supervisor: The European Data Protection Supervisor as an advisor to the Community institutions and bodies on proposals for legislation and related documents. Strategy paper, Brussels, 18 March 2005, 5.3. The European Data Protection Supervisor and other consultants in the field of data protection , p. 13 f (ESDP opinion on data protection group "Article 29", PDF , de, edps.europa.eu)