Personal Data Protection Inspector Tamar Kaldani submitted 2015 Report on the State of Personal Data Protection in Georgia and the work of the Inspector to the Parliament’s plenary session on June 9, 2016.

Initially, Tamar Kaldani briefly reviewed her, as the country’s first Inspector’s three year working period and the reforms implemented relating to personal data protection, improving the legislation and the process of forming the Inspector’s Office as an independent supervisory institution.

Inspector reviewed 2015 working period and noted that the complaints of citizens to the Inspector’s office increased by six times while the complaints for consultations boosted by three times, moreover, the Office conducted 54 inspection of organisations including 16 public and 38 private ones, however it was revealed 64 facts of breaching the law, in particularly, in public organizations the most of the inspections were conducted at the Ministry of Internal Affairs, the inspections were also held in communications (internet and phone) companies, trade networks, banks and microfinance organizations as well as educational and medical institutions, for 41 organisations were imposed the administrative penalty including fine or warning.

The violations revealed in 2015 referred to the data collection without legal grounds or violation of principles of data processing, the legitimacy of data processing by the law enforcement agencies, disclosure of data and not providing the citizens with the information, the legitimacy of accessing to data base, the wide availability of outdated data, video and audio surveillance and direct marketing.

Since March 31, 2015, a two-stage electronic monitoring system over covert investigative activities – wiretapping has been launched, as well as the supervisory of investigation relates to the computer data. The Inspector noted in her speech that as a result of their work, illegal practice of requesting electronic communication identification data on the basis of a letter only has been eradicated, the information about the subscribers as well as the practice of requesting the information from the private organisations has been changed considerably.

“We have submitted to the Parliament the results of the examined citizens’ applications, conducted inspections and consultations and the conditions of the personal data protection in the public and private sectors. Despite the fact that the number of violations have been eradicated, the challenges still exists,” the Inspector said.

Personal Data Protection Inspector annually submits the Report to the Parliament.