Interior Ministry Denies Breaking Privacy

The Ministry of the Interior says that a website publishing rulings on foreigners does not violate anyone’s privacy.

The website in question, urskurdir.is, publishes official decisions and rulings made by different government ministries. This includes rulings made on cases involving individual foreigners.

Newspaper Fréttablaðið questioned whether or not the government has the legal right to publish this kind of material on the web, RÚV reports. The paper points out that there does not appear to be any legislation granting the government the power to make such information public.

The Ministry of the Interior, in turn, responded that all the decisions and rulings posted on the website are perfectly legal. They argue that Iceland’s information laws give government the right to publish any and all rulings.

However, there are exceptions to this right. Any personal or financial information regarding an individual cannot be made available to the public by the government, the ministry notes, including names, countries of origin and other sensitive information.