Dear citizens, dear controllers of the filing systems,

         Protection of personal data belongs to the area of basic human rights and freedoms. In the Slovak Republic personal data protection had been effectively applied for several years in accordance with the Act No. 52/1998 Coll. on Protection of Personal Data in Information Systems. The Commissioner for the Protection of Personal Data was responsible for the supervision over the protection of personal data and together with the Inspection Unit for the Protection of Personal Data settled the complaints of the data subjects and controllers processing personal data.

         A new act came into force 1 September 2002 – the Act No. 428/2002 Coll. on Protection of Personal Data. The mentioned act provides higher level of protection than the former one and its purpose is to protect personal data more precisely – it means better protection of rights and freedoms of everyone, whether personal data are processed in the territory of the Slovak Republic or abroad. The supervision over the protection of personal data was vested to the Office for Personal Data Protection of the Slovak Republic established as a state administration authority with competence over the entire territory of the Slovak Republic. It is stipulated by the act that the Office carries out its tasks independently what is the basic attribute of performing its tasks.

         Rights of data subjects were increased by the new act particularly by introducing the right to obtain a copy of his/her personal data from the controller. That means that if data subject requests from the controller a copy of his/her personal data, the controller is obliged to provide him with it.

         The act imposes new duties on the controllers that are to secure better protection of personal data and to eliminate risks of infringement of data subject´s rights. The act also enables to impose higher sanctions for violation of its provisions than the former act does.

         The President of the Office and its employees are convinced that the protection of personal data will be secured at standard level in the Slovak Republic if there is active communication among the Office, data subjects and controllers. We would like to contribute to such a communication and interaction also by establishing an information website.    

Gyula Veszelei
President of the office