September 20, 2005

40 countries sign for data protection

by brian_turner

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Protection and Privacy Commissioners at the 27th International Conference of Data, passed a declaration calling for the United Nations to prepare a legally binding instrument, clearly setting out in detail, the rights to data protection and privacy as enforceable human rights.

The declaration was adopted at the conference in Montreux, last week, with support from 40 countries. In the â€˜Montreux Declarationâ€™, the commissioners also call for governments to encourage the adoption of legislation that upholds recognised data protection principles. They ask for this to be extended to their mutual relations; and for the Council of Europe to invite non-member states of the organisation to ratify the Convention for the protection of individuals in respect of the automatic processing of personal data and its additional protocol.

International organisations have been asked to give a commitment to adhere to data protection rules; international non-governmental organisations have been asked to devise data protection standards; and hardware and software manufacturers have been asked to incorporate privacy-enhancing technologies into their products and systems.

Details of the nature of the legally-binding instrument to be adopted by the UN have not been clarified. According to Swiss data-protection commissioner Hanspeter ThÃ¼r, it could be a text adopted by the UN in the same way as human-rights provisions.

Progress in the implementation of the objectives will be regularly monitored. The first assessment will be carried out at the 28th International Conference, due to take place in September 2006 in Argentina.

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