European Court Of Justice Provides Guidance On 'Tasks Carried Out In The Public Interest.'

On 27 September 2017, the European Court of Justice ("ECJ") handed down its preliminary ruling to the Supreme Court of the Slovak Republic ("Supreme Court") regarding the interpretation of "a task carried out in the public interest" as a legitimate basis for processing personal data under Article 7(e) of the Data Protection Directive (95/46/EC) ("Directive") (Puskar v Finance Directorate of the Slovak Republic, Case C-73/16, 27 September 2017).

The ECJ ruling also considered: (i) an individual's right to an effective remedy before a court, and (ii) the admissibility of evidence obtained unlawfully, under Article 47 of the Charter of Fundamental Rights of the European Union. In this blog, however, we will look at the ECJ's interpretation of Article 7(e) of the Directive.

Background

The request for a preliminary ruling of the ECJ was made by the Supreme Court following a dispute between Mr. Puakár and the Slovakian tax authorities.

Mr. Puakár sought a decision to prevent the tax authorities from including his personal information in a confidential list of so-called 'front-men,' prepared by the tax authorities for the purpose of collecting taxes and combatting fraud ("Contested List"), and to delete any reference to him in such lists. 'Front-men' are individuals who purport to act as 'fronts' in company director roles. Mr. Puakár argued that the Contested List was drawn up without a legal basis and that his personal data was processed without his consent.

The Supreme Court referred several questions to the ECJ, including whether the provisions of Article 7(e) of the Directive permits a Member State to process personal data (i.e. creating the Contested List) for the purpose of collecting tax and combatting tax fraud without the consent of the individuals concerned.

Decision

The ECJ held that "tasks carried out in the public interest" set out in Article 7(e) of the Directive does not preclude tax authorities from processing personal data for the purpose of collecting tax and combatting tax fraud, provided that the following conditions are met:

- The tax authorities must be required by national law to carry out such tasks in the public interest (within the meaning of Article 7(e));

- The drawing up of the Contested List and including names on it must be adequate and necessary to achieve the stated objectives and therefore must be sufficient indications to assume that individuals' names are rightly included in that list; and

- All of the...