Below you may find the most important legal developments of the previous month
Data Protection:
- On 25 May, the General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) entered into force
- For the purpose of data protection, new rules concerning the role of the police and criminal justice were introduced by European Parliament Directive (EU) 2016/680, also known as the “Police Directive”
- A proposal for “ePrivacy” Regulation is currently under approval by the European Council, as part of the reform of the European Union framework for data protection and a new safe online environment
- The Hellenic Data Protection Authority published templates and instructions regarding processing activity records and the obligation to report a data breach incident, as well as a form regarding the appointment of the Data Protection Officer (DPO) on its website
- Convention 108 of the Council of Europe concerning the protection of personal data, to which the GDPR explicitly refers, was updated through the adoption of an Amending Protocol. For details:
Taxation:
- Circular 1099/27-04-2018 of IAPR regarding the notification of Opinion 13/2018 of the Legal Council of State on whether the special solidarity contribution falls under the category of "identical or substantially similar taxes" category, included in the Double Taxation Conventions currently in force, was published by the Independent Authority of Public Revenue.
- Joint Ministerial Decision 52738/ΔΕΚNΤ55/2018 regarding the definition of the terms, conditions and procedures for the implementation of the provisions of Article 71A “Patents” of Law 4172/2013 (A '167) was published.
Other Legislative Developments:
- Law 4537/2018 incorporating Directive 2015/2366/EU regarding Payment Services (and other provisions) into the Greek legislation was published in the Government Gazette A’ 84/2018.
- Law 4541/2018 regarding the "Amendment of Law 3190/1955 on Limited Liability Companies and other provisions" was published in Government Gazette A’ 93/2018.
- A Bill regarding “Societes Anonymes Companies”, being introduced by the Ministry of Economy and Development, is expected to be submitted to the Greek Parliament after the conclusion of the public consultation.
- The European Parliament has voted for the legislative proposal for Blockchain as well as other similar technologies.