Tbilisi City Court Upheld The Decision Of The Personal Data Protection Inspector On Fining “CreditON” And “CreditInfo”

2015-12-01 13:47:40

On November 25, 2015 Tbilisi City Court upheld the decision of the Personal Data Protection Inspector on fining microfinance organization “CreditON” and “CreditInfo Georgia”.

Pursuant to Article 43 of the Law of Georgia on Personal Data Protection, the Personal Data Protection Inspector imposed fines on the organizations in the amount of 500 GEL each for data processing without legal grounds. The organizations appealed the Inspector’s decision in the court.

Tbilisi City Court did not share the positions of the representatives of the companies and agreed with the decision of the Inspector, according to which while verifying citizen’s personal data microfinance organization “CreditON” exceeded its authority and violated the Law of Georgia on Personal Data Protection, since it did not have the consent of the data subject. The Law was also infringed when the data subject was refused to be provided with the information on processing of his/her data in a written form. “CreditInfo Georgia” also violated the Law of Georgia on Personal Data Protection, since it transmitted the data to the microfinance organization without legal grounds.

In August 2015 Personal Data Protection Inspector of Georgia studied the lawfulness of verifying citizen’s data by microfinance organization “CreditON” in the database of “CreditInfo Georgia” on the basis of the citizen’s complaint. The citizen, who addressed the Inspector, stated that microfinance organization “CreditON” verified data in the database of “CreditInfo Georgia” without his/her consent, which violated his/her rights.

As stated by the representatives of the Office of Personal Data Protection Inspector, the decision of the court carries significant importance, since it shared their position. Organizations need relevant legal grounds for collecting, storing or verifying citizens’ data.