Legal and ethical requirements for shared public services are key milestones of our project. Throughout the entire duration, the objective is to ensure the implementation of Interlink and its components adhere to EU and national legal frameworks and soft law instruments, as well as to key ethical and societal values and principles starting from the EU-recognised Fundamental Rights.
In achieving the main objectives, Interlink collects/produces data divided into four categories:
- Internal administrative data: data shared between individual consortium members or representatives of partner institutions to manage and coordinate the project.
- Research data: data collected as part of academic research at Radboud University on governance models and the Catholic University of Louvain (UCLouvain) on legal requirements.
- Communication data: data processed to update the website and communicate about the project activities.
- Use case data: data collected within the three use cases e.g. personal data of the participants, used to monitor the performance of the project.
The legal framework applicable to the Interlink project consists mainly of the legislation on the processing of personal data. As public administrations are involved in the project as stakeholders, the laws relating to data held by public sector bodies are also part of the legal framework applicable to the project. Finally, the Rules applicable to the EU research and innovation framework programme apply.
Interlink and its legal requirements
The EU laws relevant to the activities of Interlink are the General Data Protection Regulation and Open Data Directive, then the Framework Programme for Research and Innovation. Secondly, the national laws of Italy, Latvia, and Spain, as the Member States where the use cases are implemented.
Personal data falls within the scope of the General Data Protection Regulation – GDPR. Its principles were respected in any processing activity and partners ensured that data subjects have access to the rights afforded to them.
The Open Data Directive applies to public bodies, public enterprises, and research institutions. Universities may also be covered by the Directive, depending on their legal status (as a public body, public undertaking, or private sector entity) and their activities (in particular, whether they are considered research institutions). Therefore, most of our partners fall under the scope of the Directive.
According to it, access to data can be requested by companies, other public bodies or public companies, researchers, and citizens. In general, the Directive covers all publicly available public sector information, such as geographical, cadastral, statistical, or legal data managed by public bodies and some public undertakings, as well as publicly funded research data. It applies to all types of documents containing such data, including text documents, databases, audio files, and film fragments.
However, a few cases are excluded from the application of the Directive. Most importantly, the Directive does not apply to personal data. Therefore, Interlink uses case data is not affected by the Directive.
