Europe: Protection of privacy and media privilege - interesting court ruling

BRUSSELS - 22 / 2 / 2009 - The core of the disagreement was dissemination of individual income tax information via a specialised newspaper in Finland. The European Court of Justice was asked to look into the delicate balance between protection of privacy and freedom of expression.

The Finish tax-newspaper Veropörssi for years has published names of more than a million Fins, whose income is above a certain threshold. In Finland this information is public. As a part of it's service to readers, the information could be disseminated via an sms-service for an extra payment.

This lead to a court case in Finland, which forwarded some questions regarding the balance between privacy protection and freedom of expression to the European Court of Justice. In it's ruling of December 16th 2008, the court reaches a conclusion, where freedom of expression is granted strong weight. The fact, that the media have commercial interests in the dissemination is not considered contrary to the right of freedom of expression. Finally modern dissemination methods are to be considered equally to other ways of disseminating journalistic products.

Read the entire judgement here and some key points below

58 First, as the Advocate General pointed out at point 65 of her Opinion and as is apparent from the legislative history of the directive, the exemptions and derogations provided for in Article 9 of the directive apply not only to media undertakings but also to every person engaged in journali

59 Secondly, the fact that the publication of data within the public domain is done for profit-making purposes does not, prima facie, preclude such publication being considered as an activity undertaken ‘solely for journalistic purposes’. As Markkinapörssi and Satamedia state in their observations and as the Advocate General noted at point 82 of her Opinion, every undertaking will seek to generate a profit from its activities. A degree of commercial success may even be essential to professional journalistic activity.

60 Thirdly, account must be taken of the evolution and proliferation of methods of communication and the dissemination of information. As was mentioned by the Swedish Government in particular, the medium which is used to transmit the processed data, whether it be classic in nature, such as paper or radio waves, or electronic, such as the internet, is not determinative as to whether an activity is undertaken ‘solely for journalistic purposes’.

61 It follows from all of the above that activities such as those involved in the main proceedings, relating to data from documents which are in the public domain under national legislation, may be classified as ‘journalistic activities’ if their object is the disclosure to the public of information, opinions or ideas, irrespective of the medium which is used to transmit them. They are not limited to media undertakings and may be undertaken for profit-making purposes.

62 The answer to the second question should therefore be that Article 9 of the directive is to be interpreted as meaning that the activities referred to at points (a) to (d) of the first question, relating to data from documents which are in the public domain under national legislation, must be considered as activities involving the processing of personal data carried out ‘solely for journalistic purposes’, within the meaning of that provision, if the sole object of those activities is the disclosure to the public of information, opinions or ideas. Whether that is the case is a matter for the national court to determine.