According to the monitoring carried out by the Defender’s Office, it was recorded that in individual publications made by law enforcement agencies, identifying data of persons suspected of committing alleged crimes are directly indicated: the data of their user accounts on social networks, name, surname, and other personal data, and in some cases, also photos of persons.

“In this regard, the Defender emphasizes that the publication of data identifying a person involved in criminal proceedings by law enforcement agencies must meet the relevant international and national standards. Otherwise, the state may violate the fundamental right to respect for private life. In that context, it is key that the publication of data about the mentioned persons can be carried out only in the presence of a legitimate purpose, if it stems from a social need that prevails over the interest of privacy of personal data, and such publication must be proportionate to the pursued purpose. Moreover, such publications should be limited as much as possible to the scope of data the publication of which is very necessary due to the specifics of the given criminal proceedings. This is also required by the case law of the European Court of Human Rights.

As for the publication of photographs, according to the ECtHR case law, in cases where the publication of the photograph itself has no informative value within the framework of criminal proceedings, particularly weighty reasons are needed to consider such an interference with the right to respect for private life as legitimate. For example, the publication of the data of the fugitive accused in order to ensure his/her identification by the public was considered by the European Court as such a valid reason.

Taking into account the above said, the Defender calls on the competent state bodies to take into account the presented criteria when making similar publications, in order to exclude possible violations of the right to respect for private life,” the statement reads.