The legitimate concern expressed by conscientious citizens residing all over the world inside and outside Venezuela, whether or not to put their personal data in a web page to register in a primary of the official opposition, WITHOUT HAVING PREVIOUSLY DEFINED who will control that process, is another of the many chapters of the crazy electoral history of this tyranny that has subjugated the country for more than 23 years, and that must be told very well to the new generations.
Effectively, the regime has found a formula so that the opposition population itself provides them with the data of who and where the opposition voters are and where they are. With the advancement of this collection, the National Commission of Primaries, CNP, of the official opposition, could deliver the data they are now collecting to the CNE for the updating of their database, once they successfully conclude their negotiations. No one should be able to negotiate with such information without the consent of the owner of such data.
In Venezuela there is no special and specific legal framework for the Protection of Personal Data of citizens. All Latin American countries, with the exception of Cuba, have legislations that strongly regulate the storage, processing, disposition and transmission of personal data in the hands of public and private entities. In Venezuela, there are no obligations or guarantees for any person who gives his data to any organization, except for the general ones provided for the State in its obligation to protect the private life of citizens, the Habeas Data and personal communications, contained in Articles 28, 48, 60 and 281.3 of the 1999 Constitution, and some special legislations such as the Law on Protection of Privacy of Communications, the Special Law against Computer Crimes and the Law on Data Messages and Electronic Signatures,
Consequently, anyone in Venezuela can request, without any regulation, private information of Venezuelans under any speech, and get them to hand over one of the most precious assets a person possesses, which is his or her own personal information. Taking advantage of the opportunity of the primary elections, many Venezuelans are falling into the trap of revealing their opposition political leanings to any registry that requests it, without any guarantee that the collector may sell, negotiate or publicly expose such information for his own benefit.
The most advanced international regulation in the world is the agreement that currently governs privacy and data protection in the European Union, entitled General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR), which establishes that it is the user who decides through a free, specific, informed and unequivocal consent, the possibility of using their data, without tacit consent or consent by omission being sufficient. In other words, if there were such a regulation in Venezuela, the CNP or any other party responsible for collecting data, could not do so without previously informing users what they will do with them, being subject to penalties established in that regulation.
The GDPR came into force in the European Union in 2018, and almost immediately Facebook, Google, Instagram and WhatsApp were accused of breaching it: "Complaints have been filed with the data protection agencies of France, in the case of Google; Belgium (Instragam), Germany (WhatsApp) and Austria (Facebook), to "facilitate European coordination". The maximum fines that these companies would face, if it were confirmed that they violate the new European regulation, range from 3.7 00 million for Google to 1,300 for the other three defendant companies. The GDPR sets, in extreme cases, penalties of up to 20 million or the equivalent of 4% of the annual global revenue of the company in question". According to these complaints, customers had to "...agree to have their data collected, shared and used for targeted advertising or delete their accounts" (see in Spanish Facebook and Google, accused of breaching the new data protection regulation, at https://cincodias.elpais.com/cincodias/2018/05/25/companias/1527268726_247540.html).
Each country, through its data protection legislation, creates a supervisory body to monitor compliance with the regulations. And as can be seen in the above case, the European Union took it very seriously. And this has a natural and particular explanation in Europe: before the arrival of automated systems for the manipulation of massive data, the statistical authorities of the countries were always the guardians and guarantors of the massive data of the people for the obvious reasons of planning. The statistical information of the citizens of the Netherlands was so detailed before the German occupation that it allowed the Nazis to register the Jewish and Gypsy population for deportation to the extermination camps. The highest numbers of extermination of "vulnerable groups" were recorded in places where the data of the citizens were best catalogued. It is for that reason that this issue has a direct connection with Human Rights and the vulnerability of people, so this problem should be very sensitive for us who suffer a tyranny that intends to eternalize itself in power.
As I commented in a previous note about this fact, some actors are already starting to collect data from Venezuelans through web pages, to be used in an election, without representing the legitimate electoral authority of the country. This includes the CNP or any interested candidate. In my opinion, the latter constitutes, to say the least, an act of lese irresponsibility because there are no proven guarantees of confidentiality for anyone, since there are no special and specific regulations that regulate this activity for entities that are not part of the public sector. Therefore, the only guarantee of data protection must be given by the Venezuelan State to the citizens, through the provisions of Articles 28, 48, 60 and 281.3 of the 1999 Constitution. But as we already know, there is no Rule of Law in Venezuela...
And in the absence of legitimate authorities in the country -the current CNE is one of those illegitimate authorities, for having been appointed by a spurious and unrecognized National Assembly- no one could collect data for an election in Venezuela, until there is a Legitimate Electoral Power. From the foregoing, it follows that no one, public or private, in the current political situation in Venezuela, can take upon himself the task of collecting, on his own account and by any means, any data from Venezuelans, if he is not a legitimate authority of the country.
From any point of view, what is happening in Venezuela is complete madness. And that is the reason why the Venezuelan opposition openly ignores the very existence of the illegitimacy of all the Public Powers, and has decided to look the other way and prepare to go to a presidential election with a gang of criminals, hoping to succeed in this nonsense. That is, starting from a situation of abject illegitimacy, to reach a situation of legitimate Public Powers with the acceptance of the International Community. It is impossible to imagine a greater absurdity. Nothing that begins in this way can have a happy ending.
Even though it is still undefined who will control the data and the votes of the citizens of an opposition primary, Venezuelans should carefully examine who will guarantee the confidentiality of the information. That is, look very carefully to whom they will hand over the data, asking what they will do with it and how it will be protected. I do not have to explain to them what a CNE of the regime would do with them, but neither what the parties delivered to it through a CNP negotiating with an illegitimate CNE would do with them. For me it is the same thing. That is why I would cut to the chase and preserve my security, not handing them over to anyone...
Caracas, June 14, 2023
Blog:
TIC’s & Derechos Humanos, https://ticsddhh.blogspot.com/
Email: luismanuel.aguana@gmail.com
Twitter:@laguana
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