Brussels, 27/01/2011 (Agence Europe) - On Friday 28 January, the European Commission and the Council of Europe will mark the 30th anniversary of “Data Protection Day”. In Brussels, hundreds of participants - including representatives of the European Commission, the Hungarian Presidency of the European Council, NGOs and industry - will gather for a conference on the difficult issue of striking a balance between ensuring freedom of information and protecting people's privacy in the age of the internet. They will also consider how best to modernise European and international rules on data protection, which is underpinned by the Council of Europe's Convention 108. Since it was opened for signature on 28 January 1981, Convention 108 has been ratified by 43 Council of Europe member states. It is open for signature by any country in the world.
At the end of 2010, the Commission opened a public consultation as it wishes to amend European law on the protection of personal information to take account of the new technologies. It aims to bring forward a proposal for legislation in the course of this year to revise the 1995 data protection directive (see EUROPE 10250). The German data protection authority, the Bundesbeauftragte für den Datenschutz und die Informationsfreiheit, published its contribution to the consultation on 24 January. It says that national rules are no longer sufficient to ensure data protection and that a comprehensive European legal framework, with which all internet companies operating in the European Union will have to comply, is required. In particular, Germany is calling for increased legal protection on the internet and protection against profiling. Profiling, through the consolidation of data from various different sources should only be allowed in exceptional circumstances and under strict conditions, it says. (I.L./transl.rt)