What the Regulation Amending the Regulation on the Processing and Privacy of Personal Health Data Brings and the Points to Note

27 November 2017Murat Volkan DülgerCommentary

Introduction

This work was written in Turkish. The summary on this page is a translation; the citation gives the original title in parentheses.

The “Regulation on the Processing and Privacy of Personal Health Data”, which contains the rules on personal health data, an important part of the field of personal data and a special category of such data, entered into force on publication in Official Gazette No. 29863 of 20 October 2016. Law No. 6698 on the Protection of Personal Data (KVKK), the basic statute on personal data, had been published on 7 April 2016, and the Personal Health Data Regulation was published before the Personal Data Protection Board provided for in that law had been set up and had taken office. Because it was prepared without the opinion of that board being obtained, the Regulation was criticised as premature. I share the criticism directed at the publication of the Personal Health Data Regulation at a time when the Law was not yet fully understood, when some of the concepts and definitions in it were still very new and, most importantly, when the Personal Data Protection Board, to which frequent reference is made, had not yet taken office and its working procedures and principles had not been determined.