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“The State and its various entities’ bodies must understand once and for all that they have an obligation to protect citizens’ personal data and to adopt and be able to prove that they have taken all technical and organizational measures to this end.” Tiago Cabanas Alves, lawyer representing the National Data Protection Commission (CNPD) in the case that became known as “Russiagate,” responded in a statement to SAPO.
The Lisbon Administrative Court published today a judgment in which it fined Lisbon City Council €1 million for illegally sharing activists’ data on 111 different occasions between 2018 and 2021. The Court considered that it was proven that the municipality, then under the administration of Fernando Medina, collected information on protesters and representatives of associations that promoted the protests, including names, addresses, “occupation, telephone contact, nationality, date of birth, affiliation, marital status, number of taxpayer and citizenship documents, data related to residence permits and, in some cases, copies of citizenship documents”, sharing it with countries such as Russia, China, Venezuela, Libya or India, which retain this information and are not subject to GDPR due process.
The Court, which has no doubts about the guilt and intent of CML, fined Thiago Cabanas Alves €1 million, considering that he acted “freely, deliberately and consciously” with knowledge of the law and without respect for it, agreed to “make additional adjustments, considerations and necessary adjustments, taking into account the seriousness and disregard for the protection of personal data”.
“It is worth noting that this judgment is not final: the Lisbon City Council has the possibility of appealing and therefore even changing the decision”, recalls the lawyer who represented the CNPD in the process. . “But in my opinion it is a historic ruling, since the Court clarifies that public entities must take special care to protect the personal data of citizens, since they process personal data in large quantities. As is clear, they can be sanctioned, as in Portugal, the obligations imposed by the General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) on those responsible for processing apply to both the public and private sectors, according to the will of the legislator”, stresses the jurist.
We also contacted Tiago Félix da Costa, the lawyer who represented the municipality in the Russiagate case, who did not respond to SAPO’s request for comment until the time of this news release.
An official source from Lisbon City Council confirmed that it is still considering whether to proceed with the appeal against the decision. He did not make any additional comments on what was made public when the decision was made public, only to once again lament the “heavy socialist legacy” and to assure that he would always “defend the people of Lisbon” https://www.sapo .pt/noticias/current/articles/. “The City Council once again regrets the heavy legacy left by the previous socialist administration and its very relevant impact. In order to defend the interests of Lisbon residents, the City Council is evaluating whether it will appeal the decision. The current president of the CML, Carlos Moedas, admitted that the court’s decision is now well known.
However, for Thiago Cabanas Alves, “justice has worked”. Even because “it allowed the existence of an administrative procedure that led to the imposition of a fine, while at the same time the target entity had the possibility to ask the Court to assess the legality, which led to this judgment” https:// www .sapo.pt/noticias/atualidade/artigos/. “Beyond this, the judgment strongly condemns the approach of the Lisbon City Council, fully confirming the accusations of the CNPD. In this sentence, the reduction of the fine was only due to the passage of time, which led to the regulation of the existing procedures of the Municipality, rather than any positive judgment, which fortunately changed after the intervention of the CNPD”, the lawyer also told SAPO.
For the CNPD representative, the only regret is that “due to the lack of clarity in the Personal Data Protection Law (LPDP) and due to judicial delays, too much time was wasted discussing which court would be competent to hear the case.” The fine they stipulated. “Remember that the initial fine added 222,500 euros to the invoice. “Nevertheless, I believe that this sentence shows that the protection of personal data must be considered a priority for all entities, public and private”, he said, citing not the amount of the fine, but the reputational damage that non-compliance could mean for users or customers. “Regardless of who was the President of the Lisbon City Council when the incident occurred, the City Council should abide by the judgment now or appeal,” he stressed.
When asked about the current behavior of public bodies with regard to the processing of personal data, Thiago Cabanas Alves has no doubts: “I believe that this is a real victory for this sentence, whatever the outcome of a possible appeal may be. It is clear that the GDPR applies to public entities and that they must clearly assume that their procedures are in compliance with the General Data Protection Regulation, it is no longer worth ignoring its existence or that it will not have consequences.”
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