Results of Flash Eurobarometer survey on Data Protection that was conducted in January 2008 have been published. Previous waves of the survey had been performed three times before, in 1991, 1996 and 2003. Fieldwork was carried out from January 8th to 12th, 2008. Over 27,000 randomly selected citizens aged 15 years and over were interviewed in the 27 EU Member States.

A majority of EU citizens showed concern about data protection issues. Two-thirds of survey participants said they were concerned as to whether organisations that held their personal data handled this data appropriately (64%). The level of concern about data protection has only changed slightly since the early 1990s. Two-thirds of respondents were concerned about this in 1991. Since then, the number has fluctuated, before returning - in 2008 - to the early 1991 level (68%).    

Respondents tended to see:

• Low levels of data protection in their own country. Not even half of respondents (48%) thought that their data was properly protected in their own country.
• They also felt that their fellow citizens had low levels of awareness about data protection (77%).

The interviewees were presented with a list of rights European citizens have vis-à-vis organisations that hold their data, such as their right to take legal action in case of abuse of personal information or to be compensated for the resulting damage. Each of the listed rights was familiar to a majority of the respondents. However, only a quarter of respondents knew that European citizens enjoyed all of those rights (27%).

Since 1991, the European Commission has been monitoring the perceptions, attitudes and views of the EU’s citizens on data protection issues. Over the last two decades, data protection in the EU has faced new challenges and has undergone important changes. In order to face these changes, as of 1995, the European Commission has carried out legislation aiming at ensuring high level of data protection for all EU citizens.

Against this background, the European Commission commissioned two Eurobarometer surveys, investigating perceptions on data protection respectively among EU citizens and data controllers in private companies.

People who are responsible for processing data in private companies ("data controllers"), generally made a positive evaluation of the requirements of the data protection laws: 91% rather agreed that the requirements of the data protection law are necessary in order to guarantee a high level of protection for consumers and the fundamental rights of citizens. However, half of them believe that legislation cannot cope with the increasing amount of personal information being exchanged and only 5% of respondents think that the existing legislation concerning data protection was very well suited.

The full report has been published on the Official website of the European Union.

Perceptions amongst European data controllers

Perceptions about the current data protection legislation:

• Large proportion of respondents (56%) considered the protection level offered to citizens by their respective national data protection laws as ‘medium’. Twenty-eight percent said the protection level was ‘high’ and only 11% indicated that it was ‘low’.
• 38% agreed there was sufficient harmonisation of data protection laws – across Member States – to allow personal data to be freely exchanged within the EU, compared to 33% who did not agree.
• A third (33%) thought that the data protection law was interpreted and applied more rigorously in their country than in other Member States, while a quarter (25%) said the opposite.