10. 06. 2014

ŠABIĆ: SERIOUS STEP FORWARD

Changes and amendments to the Law on Electronic Communications, adopted recently by the Serbian government, are a serious step forward in terms of personal data protection and respect of the Serbian Constitution, Rodoljub Šabić, Commissioner for Information of Public Importance and Personal Data Protection, said to daily "Danas".

"Provisions that were changed in the Law on Electronic Communications are now in accordance with constitutional guarantees, which is progressive in comparisom to the previous situation and to the ideas that used to be dominant. Finally a disputed part of the Law was removed, and therefore now a court decision is needed for every access to personal data. This solution is in accordance with the Constitution", Šabić assessed.

According to Šabić, it is also good that, after the changes, the Law now prescribes that security services and operators are obliged to keep adequate records on the access to databases. He added that this introduces a more adequate control of personal data protection.

Withheld data is data on communication that does not pertain to the contents of communication. This data primarily pertains to surveillance and establishing the source of communication, the destination of communication, the beggining, duration and the end to communication, the type of communication, identifying users' terminal equipment, establishing location of users' mobile terminal equipment.

Using an example of a telephone conversation, this data is information on the number from which the call was placed, on the number to which the call was placed, on the date and time of the beginning and end of the telephone call, duration of the call, device used in communication (type of mobile phone), and data on the geographic location of the phone from which the call was placed.