Article 8 - Protection of personal data

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4 pending referrals

Referral C-683/23 (Encarna, 14 Nov 2023)

Referral C-280/22 (Kinderrechtencoalitie Vlaanderen and Liga voor Mensenrechten, 25 Apr 2022)

Referral C-61/22 (Landeshauptstadt Wiesbaden, 1 Feb 2022)

Referral C-548/21 (Bezirkshauptmannschaft Landeck, 6 Sep 2021)

29 preliminary rulings

of 30 Jan 2024, C-118/22 (Direktor na Glavna direktsia Natsionalna politsia pri MVRSofia)

Article 4(1)(c) and (e) of Directive (EU) 2016/680 of the European Parliament and of the Council of 27 April 2016 on the protection of natural persons with regard to the processing of personal data by competent authorities for the purposes of the prevention, investigation, detection or prosecution of criminal offences or the execution of criminal penalties, and on the free movement of such data, and repealing Council Framework Decision 2008/977/JHA, read in conjunction with Articles 5 and 10, Article 13(2)(b) and Article 16(2) and (3) thereof, and in the light of Articles 7 and 8 of the Charter of Fundamental Rights of the European Union,must be interpreted as precluding national legislation which provides for the storage, by police authorities, for the purposes of the prevention, investigation, detection or prosecution of criminal offences or the execution of criminal penalties, of personal data, including biometric and genetic data, concerning persons who have been convicted by final judgment of an intentional criminal offence subject to public prosecution, until the death of the data subject, even in the event of his or her legal rehabilitation, without imposing on the data controller the obligation to review periodically whether that storage is still necessary, nor granting that data subject the right to have those data erased, where their storage is no longer necessary for the purposes for which they are processed or, where appropriate, to have the processing of those data restricted.

of 16 Nov 2023, C-333/22 (Ligue des droits humains)

Article 17 of Directive (EU) 2016/680 of the European Parliament and of the Council of 27 April 2016 on the protection of natural persons with regard to the processing of personal data by competent authorities for the purposes of the prevention, investigation, detection or prosecution of criminal offences or the execution of criminal penalties, and on the free movement of such data, and repealing Council Framework Decision 2008/977/JHA, read in conjunction with Article 46(1)(g), Article 47(1) and (2) and Article 53(1) of that directive and with Article 8(3) and Article 47 of the Charter of Fundamental Rights of the European Union,must be interpreted as meaning that where the rights of a data subject have been exercised, pursuant to Article 17 of that directive, through the competent supervisory authority and that authority informs that data subject of the result of the verifications carried out, that data subject must have an effective judicial remedy against the decision of that authority to close the verification process.

of 8 Dec 2022, C-460/20 (Google)

Article 17(3)(a) of Regulation (EU) 2016/679 of the European Parliament and of the Council of 27 April 2016 on the protection of natural persons with regard to the processing of personal data and on the free movement of such data, and repealing Directive 95/46/EC (General Data Protection Regulation),must be interpreted as meaning that within the context of the weighing-up exercise which is to be undertaken between the rights referred to in Articles 7 and 8 of the Charter of Fundamental Rights of the European Union, on the one hand, and those referred to in Article 11 of the Charter of Fundamental Rights, on the other hand, for the purposes of examining a request for de-referencing made to the operator of a search engine seeking the removal of a link to content containing claims which the person who submitted the request regards as inaccurate from the list of search results, that de-referencing is not subject to the condition that the question of the accuracy of the referenced content has been resolved, at least provisionally, in an action brought by that person against the content provider.

Article 12(b) and point (a) of the first paragraph of Article 14 of Directive 95/46/EC of the European Parliament and of the Council of 24 October 1995 on the protection of individuals with regard to the processing of personal data and on the free movement of such data, as well as Article 17(3)(a) of Regulation 2016/679must be interpreted as meaning that in the context of the weighing-up exercise which is to be undertaken between the rights referred to in Articles 7 and 8 of the Charter of Fundamental Rights, on the one hand, and those referred to in Article 11 of the Charter of Fundamental Rights, on the other hand, for the purposes of examining a request for de-referencing made to the operator of a search engine seeking the removal from the results of an image search carried out on the basis of the name of a natural person of photographs displayed in the form of thumbnails representing that person, account must be taken of the informative value of those photographs regardless of the context of their publication on the internet page from which they are taken, but taking into consideration any text element which accompanies directly the display of those photographs in the search results and which is capable of casting light on the informative value of those photographs.

Judgment of 22 Nov 2022, C-37/20 (Luxembourg Business Registers)

Article 1(15)(c) of Directive (EU) 2018/843 of the European Parliament and of the Council of 30 May 2018 amending Directive (EU) 2015/849 on the prevention of the use of the financial system for the purposes of money laundering or terrorist financing, and amending Directives 2009/138/EC and 2013/36/EU, is invalid in so far as it amended point (c) of the first subparagraph of Article 30(5) of Directive (EU) 2015/849 of the European Parliament and of the Council of 20 May 2015 on the prevention of the use of the financial system for the purposes of money laundering or terrorist financing, amending Regulation (EU) No 648/2012 of the European Parliament and of the Council, and repealing Directive 2005/60/EC of the European Parliament and of the Council and Commission Directive 2006/70/EC, in such a way that point (c) of the first subparagraph of Article 30(5), as thus amended, provides that Member States must ensure that information on the beneficial ownership of companies and of other legal entities incorporated within their territory is accessible in all cases to any member of the general public.

Judgment of 20 Sep 2022, C-793/19 (SpaceNet)

Article 15(1) of Directive 2002/58/EC of the European Parliament and of the Council of 12 July 2002 concerning the processing of personal data and the protection of privacy in the electronic communications sector (Directive on privacy and electronic communications), as amended by Directive 2009/136/EC of the European Parliament and of the Council of 25 November 2009, read in the light of Articles 7, 8 and 11 and Article 52(1) of the Charter of Fundamental Rights of the European Union must be interpreted as meaning that:

it precludes national legislative measures which provide, on a preventative basis, for the purposes of combating serious crime and preventing serious threats to public security, for the general and indiscriminate retention of traffic and location data;

it does not preclude legislative measures that:

–   allow, for the purposes of safeguarding national security, recourse to an instruction requiring providers of electronic communications services to retain, generally and indiscriminately, traffic and location data in situations where the Member State concerned is confronted with a serious threat to national security that is shown to be genuine and present or foreseeable, where the decision imposing such an instruction is subject to effective review, either by a court or by an independent administrative body whose decision is binding, the aim of that review being to verify that one of those situations exists and that the conditions and safeguards which must be laid down are observed, and where that instruction may be given only for a period that is limited in time to what is strictly necessary, but which may be extended if that threat persists;

–   provide, for the purposes of safeguarding national security, combating serious crime and preventing serious threats to public security, for the targeted retention of traffic and location data which is limited, on the basis of objective and non-discriminatory factors, according to the categories of persons concerned or using a geographical criterion, for a period that is limited in time to what is strictly necessary, but which may be extended;–   provide, for the purposes of safeguarding national security, combating serious crime and preventing serious threats to public security, for the general and indiscriminate retention of IP addresses assigned to the source of an internet connection for a period that is limited in time to what is strictly necessary;

–   provide, for the purposes of safeguarding national security, combating crime and safeguarding public security, for the general and indiscriminate retention of data relating to the civil identity of users of electronic communications systems;–   allow, for the purposes of combating serious crime and, a fortiori, safeguarding national security, recourse to an instruction requiring providers of electronic communications services, by means of a decision of the competent authority that is subject to effective judicial review, to undertake, for a specified period of time, the expedited retention of traffic and location data in the possession of those service providers,

provided that those measures ensure, by means of clear and precise rules, that the retention of data at issue is subject to compliance with the applicable substantive and procedural conditions and that the persons concerned have effective safeguards against the risks of abuse.

of 20 Sep 2022, C-339/20 (VD)

Article 12(2)(a) and (d) of Directive 2003/6/EC of the European Parliament and of the Council of 28 January 2003 on insider dealing and market manipulation (market abuse) and Article 23(2)(g) and (h) of Regulation (EU) No 596/2014 of the European Parliament and of the Council of 16 April 2014 on market abuse (market abuse regulation) and repealing Directive 2003/6 and Commission Directives 2003/124/EC, 2003/125/EC and 2004/72/EC, read in conjunction with Article 15(1) of Directive 2002/58/EC of the European Parliament and of the Council of 12 July 2002 concerning the processing of personal data and the protection of privacy in the electronic communications sector (Directive on privacy and electronic communications), as amended by Directive 2009/136/EC of the European Parliament and of the Council of 25 November 2009, and read in the light of Articles 7, 8 and 11 and of Article 52(1) of the Charter of Fundamental Rights of the European Union must be interpreted as:precluding legislative measures which, as a preventive measure, in order to combat market abuse offences including insider dealing, provide for the general and indiscriminate retention of traffic data for a year from the date on which they were recorded.

of 1 Aug 2022, C-184/20 (Vyriausioji tarnybinės etikos komisija)

Article 7(c) of Directive 95/46/EC of the European Parliament and of the Council of 24 October 1995 on the protection of individuals with regard to the processing of personal data and on the free movement of such data and point (c) of the first subparagraph of Article 6(1) and Article 6(3) of Regulation (EU) 2016/679 of the European Parliament and of the Council of 27 April 2016 on the protection of natural persons with regard to the processing of personal data and on the free movement of such data, and repealing Directive 95/46/EC (General Data Protection Regulation), read in the light of Articles 7, 8 and 52(1) of the Charter of Fundamental Rights of the European Union, must be interpreted as precluding national legislation that provides for the publication online of the declaration of private interests that any head of an establishment receiving public funds is required to lodge, in so far as, in particular, that publication concerns name-specific data relating to his or her spouse, cohabitee or partner, or to persons who are close relatives of the declarant, or are known by him or her, liable to give rise to a conflict of interests, or concerns any transaction concluded during the last 12 calendar months the value of which exceeds EUR 3 000.

Judgment of 5 Apr 2022, C-140/20 (Commissioner of the Garda Síochána and Others)

Article 15(1) of Directive 2002/58, as amended by Directive 2009/136, read in the light of Articles 7, 8 and 11 and Article 52(1) of the Charter of Fundamental Rights, must be interpreted as precluding national legislation pursuant to which the centralised processing of requests for access to data, which have been retained by providers of electronic communications services, issued by the police in the context of the investigation or prosecution of serious criminal offences, is the responsibility of a police officer, who is assisted by a unit established within the police service which has a degree of autonomy in the exercise of its duties, and whose decisions may subsequently be subject to judicial review.

of 15 Jun 2021, C-645/19 (Facebook Ireland and Others)

Article 55(1), Articles 56 to 58 and Articles 60 to 66 of Regulation (EU) 2016/679 of the European Parliament and of the Council of 27 April 2016 on the protection of natural persons with regard to the processing of personal data and on the free movement of such data, and repealing Directive 95/46/EC (General Data Protection Regulation), read together with Articles 7, 8 and 47 of the Charter of Fundamental Rights of the European Union, must be interpreted as meaning that a supervisory authority of a Member State which, under the national legislation adopted in order to transpose Article 58(5) of that regulation, has the power to bring any alleged infringement of that regulation to the attention of a court of that Member State and, where necessary, to initiate or engage in legal proceedings, may exercise that power in relation to an instance of cross-border data processing even though it is not the ‘lead supervisory authority’, within the meaning of Article 56(1) of that regulation, with respect to that data processing, provided that that power is exercised in one of the situations where Regulation 2016/679 confers on that supervisory authority a competence to adopt a decision finding that such processing is in breach of the rules contained in that regulation and that the cooperation and consistency procedures laid down by that regulation are respected.

Judgment of 2 Mar 2021, C-746/18 (Prokuratuur)

Article 15(1) of Directive 2002/58, as amended by Directive 2009/136, read in the light of Articles 7, 8 and 11 and Article 52(1) of the Charter of Fundamental Rights, must be interpreted as precluding national legislation that confers upon the public prosecutor’s office, whose task is to direct the criminal pre-trial procedure and to bring, where appropriate, the public prosecution in subsequent proceedings, the power to authorise access of a public authority to traffic and location data for the purposes of a criminal investigation.

Judgment of 6 Oct 2020, C-511/18 (La Quadrature du Net and others)

Article 15(1) of Directive 2002/58/EC of the European Parliament and of the Council of 12 July 2002 concerning the processing of personal data and the protection of privacy in the electronic communications sector (Directive on privacy and electronic communications), as amended by Directive 2009/136/EC of the European Parliament and of the Council of 25 November 2009, read in the light of Articles 7, 8 and 11 and Article 52(1) of the Charter of Fundamental Rights of the European Union, must be interpreted as precluding legislative measures which, for the purposes laid down in Article 15(1), provide, as a preventive measure, for the general and indiscriminate retention of traffic and location data. By contrast, Article 15(1) of Directive 2002/58, as amended by Directive 2009/136, read in the light of Articles 7, 8 and 11 and Article 52(1) of the Charter of Fundamental Rights, does not preclude legislative measures that:– allow, for the purposes of safeguarding national security, recourse to an instruction requiring providers of electronic communications services to retain, generally and indiscriminately, traffic and location data in situations where the Member State concerned is confronted with a serious threat to national security that is shown to be genuine and present or foreseeable, where the decision imposing such an instruction is subject to effective review, either by a court or by an independent administrative body whose decision is binding, the aim of that review being to verify that one of those situations exists and that the conditions and safeguards which must be laid down are observed, and where that instruction may be given only for a period that is limited in time to what is strictly necessary, but which may be extended if that threat persists;– provide, for the purposes of safeguarding national security, combating serious crime and preventing serious threats to public security, for the targeted retention of traffic and location data which is limited, on the basis of objective and non-discriminatory factors, according to the categories of persons concerned or using a geographical criterion, for a period that is limited in time to what is strictly necessary, but which may be extended;– provide, for the purposes of safeguarding national security, combating serious crime and preventing serious threats to public security, for the general and indiscriminate retention of IP addresses assigned to the source of an Internet connection for a period that is limited in time to what is strictly necessary;– provide, for the purposes of safeguarding national security, combating crime and safeguarding public security, for the general and indiscriminate retention of data relating to the civil identity of users of electronic communications systems;– allow, for the purposes of combating serious crime and, a fortiori, safeguarding national security, recourse to an instruction requiring providers of electronic communications services, by means of a decision of the competent authority that is subject to effective judicial review, to undertake, for a specified period of time, the expedited retention of traffic and location data in the possession of those service providers,provided that those measures ensure, by means of clear and precise rules, that the retention of data at issue is subject to compliance with the applicable substantive and procedural conditions and that the persons concerned have effective safeguards against the risks of abuse.

Article 15(1) of Directive 2002/58, as amended by Directive 2009/136, read in the light of Articles 7, 8 and 11 and Article 52(1) of the Charter of Fundamental Rights, must be interpreted as not precluding national rules which requires providers of electronic communications services to have recourse, first, to the automated analysis and real-time collection, inter alia, of traffic and location data and, second, to the real-time collection of technical data concerning the location of the terminal equipment used, where:– recourse to automated analysis is limited to situations in which a Member State is facing a serious threat to national security which is shown to be genuine and present or foreseeable, and where recourse to such analysis may be the subject of an effective review, either by a court or by an independent administrative body whose decision is binding, the aim of that review being to verify that a situation justifying that measure exists and that the conditions and safeguards that must be laid down are observed; and where– recourse to the real-time collection of traffic and location data is limited to persons in respect of whom there is a valid reason to suspect that they are involved in one way or another in terrorist activities and is subject to a prior review carried out either by a court or by an independent administrative body whose decision is binding in order to ensure that such real-time collection is authorised only within the limits of what is strictly necessary. In cases of duly justified urgency, the review must take place within a short time.

Directive 2000/31/EC of the European Parliament and of the Council of 8 June 2000 on certain legal aspects of information society services, in particular electronic commerce, in the Internal Market (‘Directive on electronic commerce’), must be interpreted as not being applicable in the field of the protection of the confidentiality of communications and of natural persons as regards the processing of personal data in the context of information society services, such protection being governed by Directive 2002/58, as amended by Directive 2009/136, or by Regulation (EU) 2016/679 of the European Parliament and of the Council of 27 April 2016 on the protection of natural persons with regard to the processing of personal data and on the free movement of such data, and repealing Directive 95/46/EC, as appropriate. Article 23(1) of Regulation 2016/679, read in the light of Articles 7, 8 and 11 and Article 52(1) of the Charter of Fundamental Rights, must be interpreted as precluding national legislation which requires that providers of access to online public communication services and hosting service providers retain, generally and indiscriminately, inter alia, personal data relating to those services.

A national court may not apply a provision of national law empowering it to limit the temporal effects of a declaration of illegality, which it is bound to make under that law, in respect of national legislation imposing on providers of electronic communications services – with a view to, inter alia, safeguarding national security and combating crime – an obligation requiring the general and indiscriminate retention of traffic and location data that is incompatible with Article 15(1) of Directive 2002/58, as amended by Directive 2009/136, read in the light of Articles 7, 8 and 11 and Article 52(1) of the Charter of Fundamental Rights. Article 15(1), interpreted in the light of the principle of effectiveness, requires national criminal courts to disregard information and evidence obtained by means of the general and indiscriminate retention of traffic and location data in breach of EU law, in the context of criminal proceedings against persons suspected of having committed criminal offences, where those persons are not in a position to comment effectively on that information and that evidence and they pertain to a field of which the judges have no knowledge and are likely to have a preponderant influence on the findings of fact.

of 6 Oct 2020, C-623/17 (Privacy International)

Article 15(1) of Directive 2002/58, as amended by Directive 2009/136, read in the light of Article 4(2) TEU and Articles 7, 8 and 11 and Article 52(1) of the Charter of Fundamental Rights of the European Union, must be interpreted as precluding national legislation enabling a State authority to require providers of electronic communications services to carry out the general and indiscriminate transmission of traffic data and location data to the security and intelligence agencies for the purpose of safeguarding national security.

of 16 Jul 2020, C-311/18 (Facebook Ireland and Schrems)

Article 58(2)(f) and (j) of Regulation 2016/679 must be interpreted as meaning that, unless there is a valid European Commission adequacy decision, the competent supervisory authority is required to suspend or prohibit a transfer of data to a third country pursuant to standard data protection clauses adopted by the Commission, if, in the view of that supervisory authority and in the light of all the circumstances of that transfer, those clauses are not or cannot be complied with in that third country and the protection of the data transferred that is required by EU law, in particular by Articles 45 and 46 of that regulation and by the Charter of Fundamental Rights, cannot be ensured by other means, where the controller or a processor has not itself suspended or put an end to the transfer.

Examination of Commission Decision 2010/87/EU of 5 February 2010 on standard contractual clauses for the transfer of personal data to processors established in third countries under Directive 95/46/EU of the European Parliament and of the Council, as amended by Commission Implementing Decision (EU) 2016/2297 of 16 December 2016 in the light of Articles 7, 8 and 47 of the Charter of Fundamental Rights has disclosed nothing to affect the validity of that decision.

of 11 Dec 2019, C-708/18 (Asociatia de Proprietari bloc M5A-ScaraA)

Article 6(1)(c) and Article 7(f) of Directive 95/46/EC of the European Parliament and of the Council of 24 October 1995 on the protection of individuals with regard to the processing of personal data and on the free movement of such data, read in the light of Articles 7 and 8 of the Charter of Fundamental Rights of the European Union, must be interpreted as not precluding national provisions which authorise the installation of a video surveillance system, such as the system at issue in the main proceedings, installed in the common parts of a residential building, for the purposes of pursuing legitimate interests of ensuring the safety and protection of individuals and property, without the consent of the data subjects, if the processing of personal data carried out by means of the video surveillance system at issue fulfils the conditions laid down in Article 7(f), which it is for the referring court to determine.

Judgment of 24 Sep 2019, C-136/17 (GC and Others)

The provisions of Directive 95/46 must be interpreted as meaning that– first, information relating to legal proceedings brought against an individual and, as the case may be, information relating to an ensuing conviction are data relating to ‘offences’ and ‘criminal convictions’ within the meaning of Article 8(5) of Directive 95/46, and– second, the operator of a search engine is required to accede to a request for de-referencing relating to links to web pages displaying such information, where the information relates to an earlier stage of the legal proceedings in question and, having regard to the progress of the proceedings, no longer corresponds to the current situation, in so far as it is established in the verification of the reasons of substantial public interest referred to in Article 8(4) of Directive 95/46 that, in the light of all the circumstances of the case, the data subject’s fundamental rights guaranteed by Articles 7 and 8 of the Charter of Fundamental Rights of the European Union override the rights of potentially interested internet users protected by Article 11 of the Charter.

Judgment of 2 Oct 2018, C-207/16 (Ministerio Fiscal)

Judgment of 9 Mar 2017, C-398/15 (Manni)

Article 6(1)(e), Article 12(b) and subparagraph (a) of the first paragraph of Article 14 of Directive 95/46/EC of the European Parliament and of the Council of 24 October 1995 on the protection of individuals with regard to the processing of personal data and on the free movement of such data, read in conjunction with Article 3 of the First Council Directive 68/151/EEC of 9 March 1968 on co-ordination of safeguards which, for the protection of the interests of members and others, are required by Member States of companies within the meaning of the second paragraph of Article 58 of the Treaty, with a view to making such safeguards equivalent throughout the Community, as amended by Directive 2003/58/EC of the European Parliament and of the Council of 15 July 2003, must be interpreted as meaning that, as EU law currently stands, it is for the Member States to determine whether the natural persons referred to in Article 2(1)(d) and (j) of that directive may apply to the authority responsible for keeping, respectively, the central register, commercial register or companies register to determine, on the basis of a case-by-case assessment, if it is exceptionally justified, on compelling legitimate grounds relating to their particular situation, to limit, on the expiry of a sufficiently long period after the dissolution of the company concerned, access to personal data relating to them, entered in that register, to third parties who can demonstrate a specific interest in consulting that data.

Judgment of 21 Dec 2016, C-203/15 (Tele2 Sverige)

Article 15(1) of Directive 2002/58, as amended by Directive 2009/136, read in the light of Articles 7, 8 and 11 and Article 52(1) of the Charter of Fundamental Rights, must be interpreted as precluding national legislation governing the protection and security of traffic and location data and, in particular, access of the competent national authorities to the retained data, where the objective pursued by that access, in the context of fighting crime, is not restricted solely to fighting serious crime, where access is not subject to prior review by a court or an independent administrative authority, and where there is no requirement that the data concerned should be retained within the European Union.

Judgment of 6 Oct 2015, C-362/14 (Schrems I)

Article 25(6) of Directive 95/46/EC of the European Parliament and of the Council of 24 October 1995 on the protection of individuals with regard to the processing of personal data and on the free movement of such data as amended by Regulation (EC) No 1882/2003 of the European Parliament and of the Council of 29 September 2003, read in the light of Articles 7, 8 and 47 of the Charter of Fundamental Rights of the European Union, must be interpreted as meaning that a decision adopted pursuant to that provision, such as Commission Decision 2000/520/EC of 26 July 2000 pursuant to Directive 95/46 on the adequacy of the protection provided by the safe harbour privacy principles and related frequently asked questions issued by the US Department of Commerce, by which the European Commission finds that a third country ensures an adequate level of protection, does not prevent a supervisory authority of a Member State, within the meaning of Article 28 of that directive as amended, from examining the claim of a person concerning the protection of his rights and freedoms in regard to the processing of personal data relating to him which has been transferred from a Member State to that third country when that person contends that the law and practices in force in the third country do not ensure an adequate level of protection.

Judgment of 16 Apr 2015, C-446/12 (Willems and Others)

Article 4(3) of Regulation No 2252/2004, as amended by Regulation No 444/2009, must be interpreted as meaning that it does not require the Member States to guarantee, in their legislation, that biometric data collected and stored in accordance with that regulation will not be collected, processed and used for purposes other than the issue of the passport or travel document, since that is not a matter which falls within the scope of that regulation.

Judgment of 17 Jul 2014, C-141/12 (YS and Others)

Article 12(a) of Directive 95/46 and Article 8(2) of the Charter of Fundamental Rights of the European Union must be interpreted as meaning that an applicant for a residence permit has a right of access to all personal data concerning him which are processed by the national administrative authorities within the meaning of Article 2(b) of that directive. For that right to be complied with, it is sufficient that the applicant be in possession of a full summary of those data in an intelligible form, that is to say a form which allows that applicant to become aware of those data and to check that they are accurate and processed in compliance with that directive, so that he may, where relevant, exercise the rights conferred on him by that directive.

Judgment of 13 May 2014, C-131/12 (Google Spain and Google)

Article 12(b) and subparagraph (a) of the first paragraph of Article 14 of Directive 95/46 are to be interpreted as meaning that, when appraising the conditions for the application of those provisions, it should inter alia be examined whether the data subject has a right that the information in question relating to him personally should, at this point in time, no longer be linked to his name by a list of results displayed following a search made on the basis of his name, without it being necessary in order to find such a right that the inclusion of the information in question in that list causes prejudice to the data subject. As the data subject may, in the light of his fundamental rights under Articles 7 and 8 of the Charter, request that the information in question no longer be made available to the general public on account of its inclusion in such a list of results, those rights override, as a rule, not only the economic interest of the operator of the search engine but also the interest of the general public in having access to that information upon a search relating to the data subject’s name. However, that would not be the case if it appeared, for particular reasons, such as the role played by the data subject in public life, that the interference with his fundamental rights is justified by the preponderant interest of the general public in having, on account of its inclusion in the list of results, access to the information in question.

Judgment of 8 Apr 2014, C-293/12 (Digital Rights Ireland and Seitlinger and Others)

Directive 2006/24/EC of the European Parliament and of the Council of 15 March 2006 on the retention of data generated or processed in connection with the provision of publicly available electronic communications services or of public communications networks and amending Directive 2002/58/EC is invalid.

Judgment of 12 Dec 2013, C-486/12 (X)

Article 12(a) of Directive 95/46 must be interpreted as meaning that, in order to ensure that fees levied when the right to access personal data is exercised are not excessive for the purposes of that provision, the level of those fees must not exceed the cost of communicating such data. It is for the national court to carry out any verifications necessary, having regard to the circumstances of the case.

Judgment of 17 Oct 2013, C-291/12 (Schwarz)

Examination of the question referred has revealed nothing capable of affecting the validity of Article 1(2) of Council Regulation (EC) No 2252/2004 of 13 December 2004 on standards for security features and biometrics in passports and travel documents issued by Member States, as amended by Regulation (EC) No 444/2009 of the European Parliament and of the Council of 6 May 2009.

Judgment of 24 Nov 2011, C-70/10 (Scarlet Extended)

Directives:– 2000/31/EC of the European Parliament and of the Council of 8 June 2000 on certain legal aspects of information society services, in particular electronic commerce, in the Internal Market (‘Directive on electronic commerce’);– 2001/29/EC of the European Parliament and of the Council of 22 May 2001 on the harmonisation of certain aspects of copyright and related rights in the information society;– 2004/48/EC of the European Parliament and of the Council of 29 April 2004 on the enforcement of intellectual property rights ; – 95/46/EC of the European Parliament and of the Council of 24 October 1995 on the protection of individuals with regard to the processing of personal data and on the free movement of such data; and – 2002/58/EC of the European Parliament and of the Council of 12 July 2002 concerning the processing of personal data and the protection of privacy in the electronic communications sector (Directive on privacy and electronic communications), read together and construed in the light of the requirements stemming from the protection of the applicable fundamental rights, must be interpreted as precluding an injunction made against an internet service provider which requires it to install a system for filtering– all electronic communications passing via its services, in particular those involving the use of peer-to-peer software; – which applies indiscriminately to all its customers; – as a preventive measure; – exclusively at its expense; and– for an unlimited period, which is capable of identifying on that provider’s network the movement of electronic files containing a musical, cinematographic or audio-visual work in respect of which the applicant claims to hold intellectual-property rights, with a view to blocking the transfer of files the sharing of which infringes copyright.

Judgment of 24 Nov 2011, C-468/10 (ASNEF)

Article 7(f) of Directive 95/46/EC of the European Parliament and of the Council of 24 October 1995 on the protection of individuals with regard to the processing of personal data and on the free movement of such data must be interpreted as precluding national rules which, in the absence of the data subject’s consent, and in order to allow such processing of that data subject’s personal data as is necessary to pursue a legitimate interest of the data controller or of the third party or parties to whom those data are disclosed, require not only that the fundamental rights and freedoms of the data subject be respected, but also that the data should appear in public sources, thereby excluding, in a categorical and generalised way, any processing of data not appearing in such sources.

Judgment of 5 May 2011, C-543/09 (Deutsche Telekom)

Article 12 of Directive 2002/58/EC of the European Parliament and of the Council of 12 July 2002 concerning the processing of personal data and the protection of privacy in the electronic communications sector (Directive on privacy and electronic communications) must be interpreted as not precluding national legislation under which an undertaking publishing public directories must pass personal data in its possession relating to subscribers of other telephone service providers to a third-party undertaking whose activity consists in publishing a printed or electronic public directory or making such directories obtainable through directory enquiry services, and under which the passing on of those data is not conditional on renewed consent from the subscribers, provided, however, that those subscribers have been informed, before the first inclusion of their data in a public directory, of the purpose of that directory and of the fact that those data could be communicated to another telephone service provider and that it is guaranteed that those data will not, once passed on, be used for purposes other than those for which they were collected with a view to their first publication.

Judgment of 20 May 2003, C-465/00 (Österreichischer Rundfunk and Others)

Articles 6(1)(c) and 7(c) and (e) of Directive 95/46/EC of the European Parliament and of the Council of 24 October 1995 on the protection of individuals with regard to the processing of personal data and on the free movement of such data do not preclude national legislation such as that at issue in the main proceedings, provided that it is shown that the wide disclosure not merely of the amounts of the annual income above a certain threshold of persons employed by the bodies subject to control by the Rechnungshof but also of the names of the recipients of that income is necessary for and appropriate to the objective of proper management of public funds pursued by the legislature, that being for the national courts to ascertain.

1 appeal

of 7 Mar 2024, C-479/22 (OC v Commission)

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