On 4 September, the government of Liechtenstein approved a statement regarding the total revision of the Data Protection Act, which is scheduled to enter into force on 1 January 2019. The aim of the legislation is to establish equivalence between the legal situation in Liechtenstein and the European General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR), which entered into force in May 2018.
Amendments were made particularly in the areas of criminal provisions as well as the internal organisation and review modalities of the Liechtenstein Data Protection Authority:
- Penalties for data protection violations will in future no longer be imposed by the regional court but by the Data Protection Authority. This will be accompanied by the elimination of the legislation on imprisonment for the non-recovery of a fine.
- The mandate of the Head of the Data Protection Authority will be shortened from eight to six years, and the possibility of reappointment will be reduced to twice.
- In future, the Data Protection Authority will have to inform the affected bodies and third parties in advance of issuing a request for information and disclosure of data.
In addition, corrections and standardisations were applied to around 120 special laws.
Additional Insights
The orginal statement can be found on Presseportal. (German only)