About Data Protection and Data Retention in Romania
About Data Protection and Data Retention in Romania

Summary/Abstract: Romania has a relatively short democratic experience in the protection of individual rights, including the right to privacy which was expressly stated for the first time in the 1991 Constitution. The lack of legal protection of the most intimate aspects of a human being for so many years is quite explainable, as a totalitarian state, which was the case with Romania, usually exhibits the so-called “social rights”, and inhibits the natural and indefeasible rights as privacy. Human rights became really significant primarily not because of their intrinsic value naturally acknowledged by the Romanian legislators, but especially due to external obligations related to the potential membership in international organizations such as the Council of Europe or the European Union. The right to personal data protection was subject to the same process of legal “transplant” and internal acceptance. The European Union rules related to data protection were transposed by national laws, as part of the “acquis communautaire”, which have become the core elements of the Romanian legal regime on data protection, no local particularities being added. However, another act to transpose, the directive on data retention, encountered difficulties in entering the Romanian legal system, due to constitutional considerations on individuals’ rights.

• Details
• Contents