Automated Collection of Data on a Person: Implicit Principles of Legal Regulation

Abstract

In the digital transformation context, an objective need has arisen to modernize the current personal data regulation. The legislator’s attempts to develop this regulation do not bring the required results. In this paper, the author makes an attempt to identify and critically analyze the implicit principles of legal regulation of relations in the fi ld of collecting of data on a person. The author establishes the presence of at least three implicit principles that determine the current domestic regulation, namely: (1) “preventive protection of data on a person a priori ensures the protection of the data subjects’ rights”; (2) “the protection of the data subjects’ rights should be carried out mainly through public means”; (3) “the data subjects are reasonable, so that they should bear the burden of determining the future of their personal data.” The identified principles are also critically analyzed by the author. As a result, the inconsistency and inefficiency of them in the modern context are established. The author concludes that it is necessary to conceptually reform the data collection regulation at a fundamental level, which should already be the subject of extensive discussions in the legal community. In addition, the author provides a number of recommendations on potential regulatory reform.