The development of new technologies makes privacy protection ever more difficult for ordinary citizens. This was the conclusion flowing from the ”Right to Privacy in Surveillance Society” conference, organized to commemorate the 10th anniversary of the introduction of the Data Protection Act.

Surveillance society is one in which there occurs a systematic, constant collection of data about various persons, e.g. from microchips, office identification tags, stores’ client cards, street cameras or photoradars. A report prepared by Surveillance Studies Network reveals that e.g. in Great Britain there is one CCTV camera per 14 citizens, and an average individual is daily followed by 300 cameras.

In Poland the situation is not that bad, but the number of such devices is growing rapidly – underlined dr Paweł Fajgielski of the Catholic University of Lublin.

He claimed that recordings from CCTV cameras are ever more often used as evidence in court proceedings. Fajgielski stated that the use of new technologies requires detailed legal framework for privacy protection. In the opinion of Mr Michał Serzycki, Inspector General for Personal Data Protection the regulations protect our privacy well, but only a conscious society is able to protect its privacy efficiently.

A group that also experiences problems in the field of privacy protection are public figures.

- The spheres of privacy and of public activity are not that easy to separate – said Professor Bogusław Banaszak, president of the Legislative Council.

The president of PTK Centertel mobile company, Ms Grażyna Piotrowska-Oliwa, noticed that we leave more and more information about us everywhere, often unknowingly.

For example, mobile technology facilitates the localization of individuals. Piotrowska-Oliwa said that the law obliged mobile phone companies to disclose many kinds of data at request of secret services. There are also many possibilities of unlawful data disclosure – it suffices if one fails to comply with safety procedures, hires disloyal workers or falls pray of thieves and hackers.

Serzycki claimed that there was a need to adopt an Act on monitoring. Companies are obliged to inform the persons whose data they hold about their rights. But how are they supposed to reach the people monitored in the streets every day? – asked Serzycki.