The number of complaints remained small, rising from 27 in 2005
to 52 in 2006. All but 10 of the complaints should have been
directed to national data protection authorities and not the
European Supervisor. In 2005 all but five of the complaints were
similarly misdirected.
The EDPS is still a new body, having only been formed in 2004.
It increased in size last year from having 19 staff to having 24,
and its budget increased from €3 million to €4m.
"A large majority of the complaints received continued to fall
outside of the supervisory competences of the EDPS, for instance
because they dealt exclusively with processing of personal data on
the level of the member states, where national Data Protection
Authorities are competent," said the report.
The report revealed that the body is conducting an audit of
Eurodac, the database of fingerprints of illegal immigrants and
applicants for asylum. The in-depth security audit is due to report
by the middle of this year, the EDPS said.
The report acknowledged that the EDPS still has not managed to
make data protection an automatic part of working life for EU
bodies. "[One challenge] is the implementation of data protection
rules and principles in the whole EU administration and to develop
a data protection culture as part of good governance," said the
report.
It also said that it would have to do further work to ensure
that data protection forms an integral part of policies and laws in
Europe. "The second challenge is to accomplish an integration of
data protection principles in Community legislation, and to improve
the quality of EU policies, whenever effective data protection is a
basic condition for their success," said the report. "It is clear
that this also involves successfully integrating privacy
perspectives in some areas – such as public security and law
enforcement policies – that sometimes seem to be at a different
course."
The EDPS said that it issued twice the number of opinions in
2006 that it did in 2005. The office publishes opinions on data
protection and privacy issues that arise, which often include
direct criticisms of EU bodies and policies.
The most recent opinion was published earlier this week, and was
a warning about a proposed framework for data sharing between
European police forces. The EDPS said that he had "grave concern"
about the plan. It is a "lowest common denominator approach that
would hinder the fundamental rights of EU citizens", his opinion
said.
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