ALBANIA: Institution-building for alignment with the Union acquis on the protection of personal data (Twinning)

Following the Council’s endorsement to open accession negotiations with Albania in March 2020, the need to entirely align the Albanian law with the Union acquis has been highlighted. This Twinning project is designed to meet this requirement in the areas of personal data protection and digital rights. It builds on the Albanian Strategy on the Right to Information and Personal Data Protection 2018-2020 and supports the National Strategy for Development and Integration 2015-2020 that emphasises the right of information and personal data protection and the need to strengthen the capacities of the independent institutions in charge for the defence of human rights. At the same time, it is in line with the EU Revised Indicative Strategy Paper for Albania for the period 2014-2020 which focuses on public administration reform and good governance, with a view to promoting the accession of Albania to the EU.

Objectives:
The overall objective of the project is strengthening the institutional capacities of the Information and Data Protection Commissioner (IDP) of Albania on supervising and monitoring the protection of personal data in both the public and private sector. More specifically, the project aims at supporting the IDP of Albania in further aligning the national legislation and in particular Law No. 9887/2008 “On the Protection of Personal Data”, as amended, with Union acquis in the field of protection of personal data, as well as further developing the administrative capacities of the Albanian institutions to enforce the relevant Union acquis.

Expected results:
The project is expected to further align national legislation with the Union acquis. In particular, the project expects to achieve following results:

• The alignment of national legislation with the General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) and the Police Directive.

This includes a preparation of the amendment of national legislation in line with the GDPR and the Police Directive, a comparative review and analysis of the Albanian data protection law with EU law, recommendations based on initial findings to key stakeholders, the draft of a strategy for alignment of the Albanian legal framework on personal data protection with the GDPR and the Police Directive and the drafts of sub-legal acts in application of the new law.

• Capacity building for enforcement of the new Data Protection legal framework.

This includes trainings on the new data protection framework for the relevant staff of the IDP, strengthening administrative capacities on the practical enforcement of Data Protection legislation and capacity building activities for the staff of IDP’s Office.

• Awareness-raising with controllers and processors in order to ensure that they comply with the new Data Protection Law.

This includes increasing awareness of controllers and processors of the Data Protection Law and of the novelties and introductions of the latter and providing assistance in drafting new guidelines for controllers and processors.

The official project website in English and Albanian language is online since January 2021 and can be accessed here. The kick-off meeting of the project took place on 16 February 2021.

Read more on the Kick-off event of the Twinning project “Institution-building for alignment with the Union acquis on the protection of personal data” in Albania here.

The current information leaflet on the Twinning project is attached in English and Albanian in the download area below.

Take a look at the attached video for a short presentation of the project.