Private life & Data protection

Your personal data is closely linked to your private life, which is protected by the human right to private life. Any activity with your private data interferes with your right to private life and might result in a violation of your human rights. Therefore, personal data must be protected and any activity with it must be carried out lawfully.

Right to private life

Every person has an inherent human right to his or her private life, which must be respected by everyone in society. Therefore, you have the right to control which information about your private life is known and shared by others. For example, you have the right to control information regarding your name, image, correspondence, family life, relationships with other persons, your intimate life and so on.

Although we have a right to control the use of our personal data, our interaction with society and the progress of new technology does not allow us to keep every single fact about our lives secret. This means that we disclose our data to public authorities and other persons on a regular basis, in a compulsory way or voluntarily.

Restrictions

Regardless of whether we have agreed to provide our personal data to others, from a human rights perspective, the possession and use of our data by other people affects our private life. The privacy of your private life has been reduced to a certain extent and consequently your right to your private life has been restricted.

However, not every such restriction will result in a violation of your right to private life. Only unlawful and disproportionate interference can result in a human rights violation.

Read more about the proper processing of your data.

Human Rights Guide

A European platform for human rights education