Google Spain’s ECJ Ruling Mistranslated in Italian

The Italian translation of the European Court of Justice’s Google Spain ruling is affected by serious translation errors that undermine its meaning.

The first recital of the conclusions read, in Italian

L’articolo 2, lettere b) e d), della direttiva 95/46/CE … deve essere interpretato nel senso che, da un lato, l’attività di un motore di ricerca … deve essere qualificata come  ?trattamento di dati personali ?, … e che, dall’altro lato, il gestore di detto motore di ricerca deve essere considerato come il  ?responsabile ? (enphasis added) del trattamento summenzionato, ai sensi dell’articolo 2, lettera d), di cui sopra.

The same word, “responsable” appears in the Spanish text, ? while the English text uses the words “data controller”, that Under Sect. 2 of the Dir 95/46/CE is a different legal position

Article 2(b) and (d) of Directive 95/46/EC … are to be interpreted as meaning that, first, the activity of a search engine … must be classified as ‘processing of personal data’, … second, the operator of the search engine must be regarded as the ‘controller’ in respect of that processing, within the meaning of Article 2(d).

The difference between Google being “data processor” or “data controller” is a serious one so it is of the utmost importance to find out which translation is the correct one, since the Italian courts and the Data Protection Authority are likely to refer to the Italian text.

The answer is the the English text is correct and both the Italian and Spanish are wrong. This conclusion comes from the fact that the recital points to sect. 2 lett. d) of the Directive that contains the definition of “data controller”.

But the mistakes of the Italian text don’t stop there. Talking about the role of the websites and blog owners, the translations uses the word “editori” as a false friend of the English word “publishers”. “Editore” in Italian means an entrepreneur whose business is selecting and publishing books and, broadly speaking, contents. While the Court is obviously referring to everybody handles a website, no matter if for business or what.

The Italian Data Protection Authority and Parkinson’s Law

Despite the ECJ ruling that bashed the Data Retention Directive (DRD), the Italian Data Protection Authority (IDPA) still continue to enforce the DRD local regulation as if nothing happened. And it does so without a prior “stress test” to see whether or not the Italian version of the DRD has the very same problems than the DRD itself.

The result is that these investigations might be proven useless, but only after having spent time and money in court, challenging the IDPA sanctions.

Such a waste of resources can only be justified by one word, bureaucracy and one goal, self-preservation.

It really seems that after so many decades, Parkinson’s Law still works…

Wrongful Conviction and Protection of the Innocent

Tomorrow, at the University of Milan, I shall participate to a round-table organized by the Italy Innocence Project. The topic is: The Italian Legal System and the Judiciary Mistake.

Here is the full program:

ERRORE GIUDIZIARIO E TUTELA DELL’INNOCENTE

WRONGFUL CONVICTION AND PROTECTION OF THE INNOCENT

EVENTO SPONSORIZZATO DAL CENTER FOR THE GLOBAL STUDY OF WRONGFUL CONVICTIONS DELLA FACOLTÀ DI LEGGE DELLUNIVERSITÀ DI CINCINNATI, OHIO, STATI UNITI (DIRETTO DAL PROF. M. GODSEY)

VENERDÌ 6 GIUGNO 2014 9.30 – 18.30

UNIVERSITÀ DEGLI STUDI DI MILANO – SALA NAPOLEONICA – VIA SANT’ANTONIO 10

SALUTI INTRODUTTIVI: LUCA LUPÁRIA (Professor of Criminal Procedure at the University of Milan, Director of the Italy Innocence Project); VINICIO NARDO (Segretario dell’Unione delle Camere Penali )

PRIMA SESSIONE (ORE 09.50) COORDINA: PROF. LUCA LUPARIA

L’ESPERIENZA DEGLI STATI UNITI D’AMERICA
M
ARK GODSEY (Professor at the University of Cincinnati, Director of the Ohio Innocence Project)
JUSTIN BROOKS (Professor at the California Western School of Law, Director of the California Innocence Project)

LA TUTELA DEL CONDANNATO INNOCENTE IN EUROPA
M
ICHAEL NAUGHTON (Director of the University of Bristol Innocence Project, Director of the Innocence Network UK)
DAVID LANGWALLNER (Professor at the Griffith College of Dublin, Director of the Irish Innocence Project)
SYLVAIN CORMIER (Attorney, Director of the Innocence Project of France)
EVELYN BELL (Chief Scientist of the Knoops’ Innocence Project)
MARIA EJCHART-DUBOIS (Member of the Helsinki Foundation for Human Rights and of the Innocence Legal Clinic in Warsaw)

SECONDA SESSIONE (ORE 14.45)

CAUSE E RIMEDI DELL’ERRORE GIUDIZIARIO IN UNA PROSPETTIVA COMPARATA
M
ARTIN KILLIAS (Expert in Criminology, Professor at the Universities of St. Gallen, Lausanne and Zurich) DANIEL VANEK (Expert in forensic DNA identifications, Professor at the Charles University in Prague) ERIC VOLZ (International Innocence Expert, Director of The David House Agency)
ULF STRIDBECK (Professor in Criminal Law at the Faculty of Law, University of Oslo)

ERRORE GIUDIZIARIO E SISTEMA ITALIANO
T
AVOLA ROTONDA
LUCA LUPÁRIA (Professor of Criminal Procedure at the University of Milan, Director of the Italy Innocence Project) GIUSEPPE GENNARI (Judge at the Court of Milan)
ANDREA MONTI (Attorney, Expert in forensic DNA)
MARTINA CAGOSSI (Junior researcher at the University of Milan)

EVENTO GRATUITO (PREVIA ISCRIZIONE)

TRADUZIONE SIMULTANEA INGLESE-ITALIANO

Evento accreditato dall’Ordine degli Avvocati di Milano (n. 6 crediti formativi)

Data Protetcion, MTA, Human Samples and Identity Backtracing

To comply with privacy and data-protection regulations, Material Transfer Agreements for human samples often state that the samples are either anonymous (meaning: the donor institution doesn’t know at all the ID of the patient) or anonymized (the donor institution only knows and keeps secret the patient ID.) But this compliance approach won’t work anymore, since the probability of backtracing the ID of patient accessing third parties provided information is not only a proof-of-concept but an “actual reality.”

Amending the MTA to handle this issue is far more complicated than ask the lawyers to just re-phrase their lingo, because what is actually needed is a thorough analysis of the human sample collection process back to the first ring of the donor chain.

The sooner the biobank community will address this issue, the better for the research, the pharma industry and – first of all – the patient himself.