On the 16th and 17th of May 2013 the Portuguese capital Lisbon hosted the Spring Conference of the European Prsonal Data Protection Authorities. The forum was held under the slogan "Protection of privacy: the challenges ahead". Representatives of the Commission for Personal Data Protection was its president Veneta Shopova and the Commissioner – Valentin Enev.
The main objective of the two-day meeting was to deepen the discussions on mechanisms for European citizens` personal data protection in times of rapidly evolving technologies. The Conference work was organized in six sessions – “Building the future upon experience”, “Personal data: to be or not to be”, “How to guarantee individuals’ rights on the Internet?”, “Information security: a renewed priority?”, “Strengthening DPA’s supervision and cooperation” and “Modernisation of Convention 108 and EU data protection reform”.A critical approach to the European Commission Proposal for a General Data Protection Regulation was presented. Some issues related to identity in terms of web-based services were discussed. The European Data Protection Supervisor – Peter Hustinx presented some practical aspects of improving the data protection effectiveness. Anonymisation and pseudonymisation were discussed.
Subject of discussions regarding Internet security was whether the European Commission`s legal personal data protection framework corresponds to the network challenges. In this regard, focuses of the attention were the right to be forgotten, the right to data portability, as well as the unsolicited electronic communications and cookies. Some aspects of the information security in the "cloud" were discussed. The European Network and Information Security Agency overviewed it’s activities in the area of privacy and presented it’s point of view about the personal data life cycle. The delegates of the conference discussed some key aspects of the consistency mechanism and the concept of lead Data Protection Authority, as well as the data protection supervision in the area of law enforcement. The recent developments in the modernization of Convention 108 for the protection of individuals with regard to automatic processing of personal data were presented.
At the conclusion of the Conference four resolutions were adopted: “Future of Data Protection in Europe”, “To ensure Data Protection in a Transatlantic Free Trade Area”, “Resolution on Europol” and resolution about the accreditation of Serbia and Republic of Kosovo as new members of the Conference.
During the visit, Veneta Shopova and Valentin Enev met with the Ambassador Extraordinary and Plenipotentiary of the Republic of Bulgaria to the Portuguese Republic, Mr. Todor Stoyanov. The meeting discussed issues related to the implementation of the state policy regarding the personal data protection, the good inter-institutional cooperation with the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and the partnership between data protection authorities of the Republic of Bulgaria and other European countries.
