29. June 2022
On June, 23, 2022, the Italian Data Protection Authority (Garante) released a statement on the use of Google Analytics (GA) holding the view that the use of GA by Italian websites without otherwise applicable safeguards violates the GDPR.
Garante comes out as the third data protection authority within the EU that declares the transfer of personal data through GA illegal. Earlier this year, CNIL and the Austrian data protection authority delivered a decision each, both coming to the same conclusion, namely that the use of GA violates the GDPR.
What lead to this statement is that Garante had received a number of complaints. However, it is also the product of coordination with other European privacy authorities.
In its reasoning, Garante assigns a special role to cookies that help GA to collect personal data, such as the IP address, visited pages, type of browser, and the kind of operating system. Garante considers it as proven that personal data is being transferred to the US when using GA. Garante reiterates that IP addresses qualify as personal data and that the pseudoanonymisation undertaken by GA is not sufficient to protect personal data from being accessed from US governmental agencies.
Garante called on all controllers and processors involved in Italian website operations for compliance and ordered a period of 90 days to comply with their obligations under the GDPR. The statement further states: “The Italian SA calls upon all controllers to verify that the use of cookies and other tracking tools on their websites is compliant with data protection law; this applies in particular to Google Analytics and similar services.”
21. January 2022
With COVID-19 vaccination campaigns well under way, employers are faced with the question of whether they are legally permitted to ask employees about their COVID-19 related information and, if so, how that information may be used.
COVID-19 related information, such as vaccination status, whether an employee has recovered from an infection or whether an employee is infected with COVID-19, is considered health data. This type of data is considered particularly sensitive data in most data protection regimes, which may only be processed under strict conditions. Art. 9 (1) General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR)(EU), Art. 9 (1) UK-GDPR (UK), Art. 5 (II) General Personal Data Protection Law (LGPD) (Brazil), para. 1798.140. (b) California Consumer Privacy Act of 2018 (CCPA) (California) all consider health-related information as sensitive personal data. However, the question of whether COVID-19-related data may be processed by an employer is evaluated differently, even in the context of the same data protection regime such as the GDPR.
Below, we discuss whether employers in different European Economic Area (EEA) countries are permitted to process COVID-19-related data about their employees.
Austria: The processing of health data in context of the COVID-19 pandemic can be based on Article 9 (2) (b) of the GDPR in conjunction with the relevant provisions on the duty of care (processing for the purpose of fulfilling obligations under labor and social law). Under Austrian labor law, every employer has a duty of care towards its employees, which also includes the exclusion of health hazards in the workplace. However, this only entitles the employer to ask the employee in general terms whether he or she has been examined, is healthy or has been vaccinated. Therefore, if the legislator provides for two other equivalent methods to prove a low epidemiological risk in addition to vaccination, the current view of the data protection authority is that specific questioning about vaccination status is not possible from a data protection perspective. An exception to this is only to be seen in the case of an explicit (voluntary) consent of the employee (Art. 9 (2) a) GDPR), but a voluntary consent is not to be assumed as a rule due to the dependency relationship of the employee.
As of November, employees will be obliged to prove whether they have been vaccinated, recovered from a COVID-19 infection or recently tested negative if they have physical contact with others in enclosed spaces, such as the office.
Austria was the first EU country to introduce mandatory Corona vaccination. From the beginning of February, Corona vaccination will be mandatory for all persons over 18 years of age, otherwise they will face fines of up to 3,600 euros from mid-March.
Belgium: In Belgium, there is no legal basis for the processing of vaccination information of employees by their employer. Article 9 (1) GDPR prohibits the processing of health data unless an explicit exception under Article 9 (2) GDPR applies. Such an exception may be a legal provision or the free and explicit consent of the data subject. Such a legal provision is missing and in the relationship between employee and employer, the employee’s consent is rarely free, as an employee may be under great pressure to give consent. The Belgian data protection authority explicitly denies the employer’s right to ask.
The Belgian government plans to make vaccination mandatory for health workers from April 2022.
Finland: The processing of an employee’s health data is only permitted if it is directly necessary for the employment relationship. The employer must carefully assess whether this necessity exists. It is not possible to deviate from this necessity by obtaining the employee’s consent. The employer may process an employee’s health data if this is necessary for the payment of sick pay or comparable health-related benefits or to establish a legitimate reason for the employee’s absence. The processing of health data is also permitted if an employee expressly requests that his or her ability to work be determined on the basis of health data. In addition, the employer is entitled to process an employee’s health data in situations expressly provided for by law. The employer may require occupational health care to provide statistical data on the immunization coverage of its employees.
France: In general employers may not require their employees to disclose whether they have been vaccinated, unless specific circumstances determined by law apply.
In France, mandatory vaccination has been in effect since mid-September for healthcare workers, i.e., employees of hospitals, retirement and nursing homes, care services, and employees of emergency services and fire departments.
Since July 21st, 2021, a “health passport” is mandatory for recreational and cultural facilities with more than 50 visitors, such as theaters, cinemas, concerts, festivals, sports venues. The health passport is a digital or paper-based record of whether a person has been vaccinated, recovered within 11 days to 6 months, or tested negative within 48 hours. Due to the Health Crisis Management Law No 2021-1040 of August 5, 2021 there are several workplaces where the health pass is mandatory for employees since August 30th, 2021. These include bars, restaurants, seminars, public transport for long journeys (train, bus, plane The health passport is also mandatory for the staff and visitors of hospitals, homes for the elderly, retirement homes, but not for patients who have a medical emergency.Visitors and staff of department stores and shopping malls need to present a health pass in case the prefect of the department decided this necessary. In these cases, the employer is obliged to check if his employees meet their legal obligations. However, the employer should not copy and store the vaccination certificates, but only store the information whether an employee has been vaccinated. Employers who do not fall into these categories are not allowed to process their employees’ vaccination data. In these cases, only occupational health services may process this type of information and the employer may not obtain this information under any circumstances. At most, he may obtain a medical opinion on whether an employee is fit for work.
Germany: Processing of COVID-19-related information is generally only allowed for employers in certain industries. Certain employers named in the law, such as in §§ 23a, 23 Infection Protection Act (IfSG), employers in certain health care facilities (e.g. hospitals, doctors’ offices, rescue services) and § 36 (3) IfSG, such as day care centers, outpatient care services, schools, homeless shelters or correctional facilities, are allowed to process the vaccination status of their employees.
Other employers are generally not permitted to inquire about the vaccination status of employees. But since §28b IfSG came into force on November 24, 2021, employees may only be granted access to company premises if they can prove that they have either been vaccinated, recently recovered or tested negative (so-called “3G status”). In this context, employers may require employees to provide proof of one of the three statuses but may not specifically ask about vaccination status. When it comes to processing and storing information obtained during access control, for data protection reasons, this information must be limited to the fact that employees have access to the premises (taking into account their documented status) and how long this access authorization has existed.
Under current law, while “vaccinated” status does not expire, the information may only be stored for 6 months. “Recently recovered” status is only valid for three months. After that, they must provide other proof that they meet one of the 3G criteria. A negative test is valid for either 24 or 48 hours, depending on the type of test.
Since November 2021, employers are required to verify whether an employee who has been sanctioned with a quarantine for COVID-19 infection was or could have been vaccinated prior to the infection. Under the fourth sentence of Section 56 (1) of the IfSG, an employee is not entitled to continued payment for the period of quarantine if the employee could have avoided the quarantine, e.g., by taking advantage of a vaccination program. The employer must pay the compensation on behalf of the competent authority. As part of this obligation to make an advance payment, the employer is also obliged to check whether the factual requirements for granting the benefits are met. The employer is therefore obliged to obtain information on the vaccination status of its employee before paying the compensation and to decide on this basis whether compensation can be considered in the individual case. The data protection law basis for this processing activity is Section 26 (3) of the German Federal Data Protection Act (BDSG), which permits the processing of special categories of personal data – if this is necessary for the exercise of rights or the fulfillment of legal obligations under labor, social insurance and social protection law and there is no reason to assume that the interests of the data subjects worthy of protection in the exclusion of the processing outweigh this. The Data Protection Conference, an association of German data protection authorities, states that processing the vaccination status of employees on the basis of consent is only possible if the consent was given voluntarily and thus legally valid, Section 26 (3) sentence 2 and (2) BDSG. Due to the relationship of superiority and subordination existing between employer and employee, there are regularly doubts about the voluntariness and thus the legal validity of the employees’ consent.
If employers are allowed to process the vaccination status of their employees, they should not copy the certificates, but only check to see if an employee has been vaccinated.
A mandatory vaccination for all german citizens is being discussed.
Greece: Corona vaccination became mandatory for nursing home staff in mid-August and for the healthcare sector on September 1. Since mid-September, all unvaccinated professionals have had to present a negative Corona rapid test twice a week – at their own expense – when they go to work.
Italy: Since October 15, Italy has become the first country in the EEA to require all workers to present a “green passport” at the workplace. This document records whether a person has been vaccinated, recovered, or tested. A general vaccination requirement has been in effect for health care workers since May, and employees in educational institutions have been required to present the green passport since September. In mid-October, mandatory vaccination was extended to employees of nursing homes.
Netherlands: Currently, there is no specific legislation that allows employers to process the vaccination data of their employees. Government guidelines for employers state that neither testing nor vaccination can be mandated for employees. Only occupational health services and company physicians are allowed to process vaccination data, for example, when employees are absent or reinstated. The Minister of Health, Welfare and Sport has announced that he will allow the health sector to determine the vaccination status of its employees. He also wants to examine whether and how this can be done in other work situations. Currently, employers can only offer voluntary testing in the workplace, but are not allowed to document or enforce the results of such tests.
Spain: Employers are allowed to ask employees if they have been vaccinated, but only if it is proportionate and necessary for the employer to fulfill its legal obligation to ensure health and safety in the workplace. However, employees have the right to refuse to answer this question. Before entering the workplace, employees may be asked to provide a negative test or proof of vaccination if the occupational health and safety provider deems it necessary for the particular workplace.
2. July 2018
According to a report in the magazine ‘Der Spiegel’, personal data and images of users who wanted to create Panini images with their own photos could be accessed by third parties.
The Italian scrapbook manufacturer for football images Panini has serious problems with the security of their online customer database. Through changing the browser’s URL, unauthorized persons could have accessed personal data of other customers, including pictures of minors. Therefore, the case can be considered as particularly serious.
Through its ‘MyPanini’ service, Panini offers fans the opportunity to upload photos with their own images and have these personalised images sent to them. Until a few days ago, logged in users could have also seen the uploaded images and personal data of other customers. Apparently the full name, the date of birth and partly even the place of residence of the customers are listed.
To a certain degree, the uploaded images showed children and young children from different countries in the private domestic environment, some even with their naked upper body.
The data breach was confirmed and has been known internally for days. Supposedly, the problem has been solved by a security update, but it is not possible to access the website at the moment.
It remains to be seen what financial consequences the data breach has for either Panini or the technical service provider. In accordance with new European General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) infringements of the provisions can lead to administrative fines up to 10 000 000 EUR or up to 2% of the total worldwide annual turnover of the preceding financial year.
16. March 2017
Ultimately, the Italian police department (in cooperation with Garante – Italian data protection authority) has carried out an investigation, which has revealed a violation of a data protection legislation and specific actions aimed at introducing the legal circulation of money onto the Chinese market.
Four agent companies and one multinational have turned out to split money transfers for remaining sub-threshold under this perspective. Under these circumstances an unlawful massive personal data processing of unaware individuals (payments and senders) has been performed. What is more, some of the records were up to be filed by not existing individuals or even deceased. Other records however, were left blank.
Taking into account all of the gathered facts, which actually indicated that personal data were used in order to unlawfully avoid the money laundering provisions, a wide-ranging Italian data protection authority sanctioning initiative has been launched. As a result, Garante has issued the highest fines ever in Europe.
Given the number of violations of data protection provisions, the Garante has set the whole amount of sanctions up to a total sum of almost 11,000,000 euros (850,000; 1,260,000; 1,590,000 1,430,000 euros for the agent companies and 5,880,000 euros for the multinational company).
It is believed that such a strict data protection authorities sanction will encourage individual data controllers and companies to accelerate their compliance with the upcoming GDPR (May 2018).