The right to a fair trial by an independent and impartial tribunal is a fundamental right everybody is entitled to. Through such right, transparency and publicity becomes an important guarantee of the administration of justice, in a broader sense, and as a procedural principle of different court proceedings as well. The collision between the requirements of privacy protection and transparency impose challenges on the legislator, the legal practitioners and on the judicial practice as well, from many aspects. Beyond issues of data protection, these requirements influence the publicity of the courtroom, the publicity of proceedings to the press, and the protection of personality rights.

In the general interpretation publicity is a safeguard which guarantees the indecency and impartiality of the court and it is also a significant instrument of social control. The study distinguishes between the different level of publicity in a criminal procedures such as “socially publicity”, “courtroom publicity” and “client publicity” and examines practicable problems like online-streaming during the criminal court proceeding.

In order to ensure the transparency of courts, the information stored must be provided to the parties, other authorities, and the media, taking into account applicable legal provisions.

When it comes to the operation of courts, one of the biggest problems with regard to the constitutionality of data processing is when the qualification of a particular data is changed several times in different procedural stages, and is – consequently – subject to different legal protection. Needless to say that the same data cannot be considered as both public and protected at the same time in the same procedure. However, this issue arises regularly, which is quite frankly a legal nonsense requiring an immediate and comprehensive solution.

Finally the study mentions some de lege ferenda recommendations as well.