The Albanian Helsinki Committee reacted over the news that the Socialist Party has used confidential data of voters for electoral purposes, asking the institutions to verify how these data have been collected. “In recent days, the media has published information that political parties in our country collect personal data of voters for electoral purposes, which are kept in the form of a database and determine the profiles of voters, based on political beliefs. It is the duty of the responsible institutions to make the necessary verifications on how this data is collected, as well as whether their collection and processing violates the legislation in force,” said AHC.
The Albanian Helsinki Committee draw attention to the fact that the processing and storage of political conviction of citizens alongside their identity by political parties, and or without the citizen’s consent, “constitutes a premise for violating the secrecy of the vote as sanctioned in Article 45/5 of the Constitution and/ or the right to privacy.” Also, according to AHC, the creation of voters profiles based on their political beliefs, without taking their consent, is a problematic issue.
The Albanian Helsinki Committee (AHC) has previously talked about the need for the protection of personal data, as an important aspect of the right to privacy and family life, sanctioned in Article 8 of the European Convention on Human Rights. “It is also worth noting that the Parliament of the Republic of Albania has approved the Council of Europe Convention (108) ‘On the protection of individuals with regard to the automatic processing of data’ and the Additional Protocol through laws no. 9287 and no. 9288 dated 07.10.2004,” said the Committee.
According to AHC, “specialized bodies of the Council of Europe note that at the heart of efforts to combat electoral manipulation and propaganda is the question of how personal data on voters (individually) are being processed in political campaigns, and whether this processing is done in a legal and ethical way.” The press release by AHC continued by saying that questions about the protection of family data are on the focus of an international debate on democratic integrity and the right to free elections embodied in the European Convention on Human Rights. “Thus, in a report of the Office of the Commissioner for Information in the United Kingdom, on July 2018, there is concern that 7 political parties audited by the Commissioner have significant problems with transparency and the use of people’s data in election campaigns,” said the statement of the Committee.
AHC called all the political parties to implement the legislation in force and respect the International Conventions ratified by Albania, by showing accountability and transparency towards the public, and by “respecting the privacy of each voter, but also the freedom, equality and secrecy of the vote.”
