LEGE no. 109 109 of 25 April 2007 (* updated *) on the re-use of public institutions information ((updated on 6 December 2015 *)
ISSUER
PARLIAMENT
---------- The Romanian Parliament adopts this law + Article 1 The purpose of this law is to regulate the conditions of publication and reuse of existing information in public institutions, including in order to create new information products and services. ---------- Article 1 has been amended by section 1. 1 1 of art. I of LAW no. 299 299 of 25 November 2015 , published in MONITORUL OFFICIAL no. 898 898 of 3 December 2015. + Article 2 (1) The present law regulates the legal framework of the reuse of documents in the possession of public institutions that the latter have created within the framework of their own public activity and which may subsequently be used for commercial purposes or non-commercial. ... (2) The provisions of this law are without prejudice to provisions Law no. 677/2001 for the protection of individuals with regard to the processing of personal data and the free movement of such data, with subsequent amendments and completions. ... ---------- Article 2 has been amended by section 2. 2 2 of art. I of LAW no. 299 299 of 25 November 2015 , published in MONITORUL OFFICIAL no. 898 898 of 3 December 2015. + Article 3 This law does not apply to the following types of documents: a) the documents whose making available constitutes an activity which exceeds the activity of the public service of the institutions concerned, as defined by law, provided that the activity of the public sector is transparent and be able to be the subject of an appeal; ... ---------- Lit. a) of art. 3 3 has been amended by section 4.2 3 3 of art. I of LAW no. 299 299 of 25 November 2015 , published in MONITORUL OFFICIAL no. 898 898 of 3 December 2015. b) the documents on which a third party holds intellectual property rights; ... c) the documents art. 12 12 para. ((1) of Law no. 544/2001 on free access to information of public interest, with subsequent amendments and completions, as well as documents to which public access is excluded or restricted, according to the law, including for reasons concerning the personal nature of the data and parts of documents accessible under those regimes containing personal data whose reuse has been defined by law as incompatible with the laws on the protection of individuals with regard to processing of personal data, as well as for reasons related to the confidentiality and protection of statistical data, defined by law, as well as those relating to trade secret; ... ---------- Lit. c) of art. 3 3 has been amended by section 4.2 3 3 of art. I of LAW no. 299 299 of 25 November 2015 , published in MONITORUL OFFICIAL no. 898 898 of 3 December 2015. d) documents held by public service broadcasters and their subsidiaries, as well as by other bodies and their subsidiaries which perform public broadcasting and television broadcasting services, to the extent that it is brought intellectual property rights; ... ---------- Lit. d) of art. 3 3 has been amended by section 4.2 3 3 of art. I of LAW no. 299 299 of 25 November 2015 , published in MONITORUL OFFICIAL no. 898 898 of 3 December 2015. e) with the exception of university libraries, documents held by educational and research institutions, such as, but not limited to schools, universities and research institutes, centres or research and development resorts, including organisations established for the transfer of research results to the extent that intellectual property rights are affected; ... ---------- Lit. e) of art. 3 3 has been amended by section 4.2 3 3 of art. I of LAW no. 299 299 of 25 November 2015 , published in MONITORUL OFFICIAL no. 898 898 of 3 December 2015. f) documents held by cultural institutions other than museums, libraries and archives; ... ---------- Lit. f) of art. 3 3 has been amended by section 4.2 3 3 of art. I of LAW no. 299 299 of 25 November 2015 , published in MONITORUL OFFICIAL no. 898 898 of 3 December 2015. g) documents in respect of which natural or legal persons must provide proof of a legitimate interest in order to obtain access to those documents, under the law. ... h) documents to which access is expressly restricted under the law, including cases where citizens or businesses must prove a special interest in obtaining access to documents; ... ---------- Lit. h) a art. 3 3 was introduced by section 4.2. 4 4 of art. I of LAW no. 299 299 of 25 November 2015 , published in MONITORUL OFFICIAL no. 898 898 of 3 December 2015. i) parts of documents containing only logos, moods and insignia; ... ---------- Lit. i) of art. 3 3 was introduced by section 4.2. 4 4 of art. I of LAW no. 299 299 of 25 November 2015 , published in MONITORUL OFFICIAL no. 898 898 of 3 December 2015. j) the documents resulting from the activity of the State Treasury units related to the operations ordered by their clients, except in cases where the documents are requested by public entities for the scope of their tasks public. ... ---------- Lit. j) art. 3 3 was introduced by section 4.2. 4 4 of art. I of LAW no. 299 299 of 25 November 2015 , published in MONITORUL OFFICIAL no. 898 898 of 3 December 2015. + Article 4 For the purposes of this law, the following terms and expressions have the following meaning: a) public institution: ... 1. any authority of the central or local public administration; 2. any public institution, of general or local interest, autonomous or under the control of a public authority; 3 3. any legal person other than those referred to in point 1 or 2, which was established to carry out activities of public interest without an industrial or commercial character and which are at least in one of the following situations: is financed in a majority proportion of public funds, is in subordinated or under the control of a public institution referred to in 1 1 and 2 or at least half of the members of the board of directors, the management or supervisory body shall be appointed by such a public institution; ---------- Item 3 of the letter. a) art. 4 4 has been amended by section 5 5 of art. I of LAW no. 299 299 of 25 November 2015 , published in MONITORUL OFFICIAL no. 898 898 of 3 December 2015. b) document-any information content or any part of such content, regardless of the form of data storage; ... ---------- Lit. b) of art. 4 4 has been amended by section 4.2 5 5 of art. I of LAW no. 299 299 of 25 November 2015 , published in MONITORUL OFFICIAL no. 898 898 of 3 December 2015. c) reuse-the use by natural or legal persons, for commercial or non-commercial purposes, of documents held by public institutions. The use of documents for private information of natural and legal persons and the use of information in journalistic activity is not reused; the exchange of documents between public institutions as a result of the performance of tasks public shall not constitute reuse; ... d) commercial purpose-the pursuit of obtaining, directly or indirectly, an economic or material advantage. The use of information by non-profit entities does not constitute a commercial reuse; ... e) third party-any natural or legal person, private or public law, who has an intellectual property right on the information contained in the document requested, other than a public institution. ... ---------------- Letter e) of art. 4 4 has been amended by section 4.2 1 1 of art. I of LAW no. 213 213 of 24 October 2008 , published in MONITORUL OFFICIAL no. 737 737 of 30 October 2008. f) automatic machinable format-a structured file format so as to allow some software applications to identify, recognize and easily extract specific data, including individual statements of fact and their internal structure; ... ---------- Lit. f) of art. 4 4 was introduced by section 4.2. 6 6 of art. I of LAW no. 299 299 of 25 November 2015 , published in MONITORUL OFFICIAL no. 898 898 of 3 December 2015. g) open format-a file format that is independent of the platforms used and which is available to the public, without any restriction likely to prevent the reuse of the documents in question; ... ---------- Lit. g) art. 4 4 was introduced by section 4.2. 6 6 of art. I of LAW no. 299 299 of 25 November 2015 , published in MONITORUL OFFICIAL no. 898 898 of 3 December 2015. h) formal open standard-a standard which has been established in writing and which contains specifications on the requirements as to how to ensure the interoperability of information systems; ... ---------- Lit. h) a art. 4 4 was introduced by section 4.2. 6 6 of art. I of LAW no. 299 299 of 25 November 2015 , published in MONITORUL OFFICIAL no. 898 898 of 3 December 2015. i) university-any institution in the public sector that organizes higher education, according to the provisions art. 114 of the National Education Law no. 1/2011 , with subsequent amendments and completions, at whose graduation university degrees are awarded; ... ---------- Lit. i) of art. 4 4 was introduced by section 4.2. 6 6 of art. I of LAW no. 299 299 of 25 November 2015 , published in MONITORUL OFFICIAL no. 898 898 of 3 December 2015. j) personal data-the data defined in art. 3 lit. a) of Law no. 677/2001 , with subsequent amendments and completions; ... ---------- Lit. j) art. 4 4 was introduced by section 4.2. 6 6 of art. I of LAW no. 299 299 of 25 November 2015 , published in MONITORUL OFFICIAL no. 898 898 of 3 December 2015. k) marginal cost-the directly related cost and generated strictly by the collection, preparation, reproduction, making available and dissemination of documents for reuse; ... ---------- Lit. k) art. 4 4 was introduced by section 4.2. 6 6 of art. I of LAW no. 299 299 of 25 November 2015 , published in MONITORUL OFFICIAL no. 898 898 of 3 December 2015. l) trade secret-any information that, in whole or in part, is not generally known or is not easily accessible to people in the environment who ordinarily deal with this kind of information and who acquires a commercial value by the fact that is secret, for which the legitimate holder has taken reasonable steps taking into account the circumstances, in order to be kept in secret mode; the protection of trade secret operates as long as the previously stated conditions are met in a manner cumulatively. ... ---------- Lit. l) of art. 4 4 was introduced by section 4.2. 6 6 of art. I of LAW no. 299 299 of 25 November 2015 , published in MONITORUL OFFICIAL no. 898 898 of 3 December 2015. + Article 5 ((. The re-use of documents held by public institutions shall be free. ... ((. The conditions for the reuse of documents shall not be discriminatory for similar categories of documents intended for reuse. ... ((. Where the documents are reused by a public institution for its commercial activities outside the scope of its public charge, for the provision of the documents necessary for the activities in question shall apply the same fees and conditions as valid for other users. ... ---------- Alin. ((3) of art. 5 5 has been introduced by section 7 7 of art. I of LAW no. 299 299 of 25 November 2015 , published in MONITORUL OFFICIAL no. 898 898 of 3 December 2015. (. Public institutions may permit unconditional reuse or may impose, where appropriate, a number of conditions. ... ---------- Alin. ((4) of art. 5 5 has been introduced by section 7 7 of art. I of LAW no. 299 299 of 25 November 2015 , published in MONITORUL OFFICIAL no. 898 898 of 3 December 2015. (5) The conditions in question must not necessarily limit the possibilities of reuse and should not be used to restrict competition. ... ---------- Alin. ((5) of art. 5 5 has been introduced by section 7 7 of art. I of LAW no. 299 299 of 25 November 2015 , published in MONITORUL OFFICIAL no. 898 898 of 3 December 2015. (6) In the case of documents on which libraries, including university libraries, museums and archives hold intellectual property rights, if the reuse of this type of documents is permitted, they are reusable for purposes commercial or non-commercial, in accordance with the requirements established by this Law and in compliance with the legislation on intellectual property. ... ---------- Alin. ((6) of art. 5 5 has been introduced by section 7 7 of art. I of LAW no. 299 299 of 25 November 2015 , published in MONITORUL OFFICIAL no. 898 898 of 3 December 2015. ---------------- Article 5 has been amended by section 6.6. 2 2 of art. I of LAW no. 213 213 of 24 October 2008 , published in MONITORUL OFFICIAL no. 737 737 of 30 October 2008. + Article 6 ((1) The requests for reuse of documents are made in writing, either on paper or in electronic form. Requests shall include the following elements: ... a) the public institution to which the application is addressed; ... b) the information requested so as to allow the public institution to identify the documents ... c) the identification and authentication data of the applicant, as well as the address to which the response is requested; ... d) the purpose in which the required information will be used. ... ---------- Alin. ((1) of art. 6 6 has been amended by section 8 8 of art. I of LAW no. 299 299 of 25 November 2015 , published in MONITORUL OFFICIAL no. 898 898 of 3 December 2015. (2) The settlement of applications for the reuse of documents shall be made within 20 working days from their receipt by the public institution, through the compartment for relations with the public designated in this regard. ... ---------- Alin. ((2) of art. 6 6 has been amended by section 8 8 of art. I of LAW no. 299 299 of 25 November 2015 , published in MONITORUL OFFICIAL no. 898 898 of 3 December 2015. (3) In the case of applications with a high degree of complexity, the term provided in par. (2) may be extended by an additional 20 working days. In this situation, the applicant will be notified of the need to extend the deadline for resolution, within 15 working days from the receipt of the request. ... (. For reuse, the information may be made available to the applicant in whole or in part; in the case of their partial presentation, a statement of reasons shall be made. ... (5) If the request is rejected, the public institutions shall inform, in writing, the applicant about it and shall give him the reasons for refusal. ... (6) Any rejection of the application, in whole or in part, must also be accompanied by a reference on how to challenge it, if the applicant wishes to challenge the decision received. ... (7) If the refusal is motivated on the basis of art. 3 lit. b), shall be communicated to the applicant the references relating to third parties natural or legal persons holding intellectual property rights to information, if these references are known or, if these references are not known, natural or legal person authorized from where the public institution procured the material. If the applicant shows the acceptance of the use of the document from all third parties involved, then his request will be reconsidered and resolved, as if it were a document that is not subject to art. 3 lit. b). ... (8) The decision to resolve requests for reuse of documents may be challenged by the applicant, under the conditions Law of Administrative Litigation no. 554/2004 ,, as amended. Both the complaint against the decision and the appeal are adjudicated in the emergency procedure and are exempt from stamp duty. ... ((9) Provisions of para. ((1)-(8) shall not apply to public institutions referred to in art. 3 lit. d)-f). ... ((10) Applicants may specify in the request the support and format in which they wish the documents. ... ---------- Alin. ((10) of art. 6 6 has been introduced by section 9 9 of art. I of LAW no. 299 299 of 25 November 2015 , published in MONITORUL OFFICIAL no. 898 898 of 3 December 2015. (11) The request may also refer strictly to the right of reuse of information already in the possession of the applicant or available in the public space, in which case the applicant may state that he does not wish to receive a copy of the documents in Cause. ... ---------- Alin. (11) of art. 6 6 has been introduced by section 9 9 of art. I of LAW no. 299 299 of 25 November 2015 , published in MONITORUL OFFICIAL no. 898 898 of 3 December 2015. + Article 7 (. To the extent that public institutions approve the reuse of the documents they hold, they shall be made available to the applicant, in any pre-existing format or in any language available and, if possible and appropriate, in open formats and machine-readable, together with their metadata, which is information about the data contained in the document. Both formats and metadata should, as far as possible, comply with formal open standards. ... (2) Public institutions are not obliged to create, adapt documents or provide extracts from documents, if this would require disproportionate costs, which exceed the scale of a simple operation. ... (3) Public institutions are not obliged to continue the production and storage of a certain type of documents, in order to reuse them by a private or public sector organization. ... ---------- Article 7 has been amended by section 7. 10 10 of art. I of LAW no. 299 299 of 25 November 2015 , published in MONITORUL OFFICIAL no. 898 898 of 3 December 2015. + Article 8 ((. Where fees are levied for the reuse of the information, those charges shall be limited to the marginal cost associated with the provision of the documents These costs are borne by the applicant, under the law. The income collected from the payment of these services is made to the budget of the institution that offered the data for reuse or, as the case may be, to the state budget, if the institution cannot have its own ... (2) Provisions of para. ((1) shall not apply: ... a) public institutions obliged to generate revenue to cover a significant part of the costs related to the performance of their public service activity; ... b) by way of exception, the documents for which the public institution in question is obliged to generate income to cover a significant part of the costs related to the collection, preparation, reproduction and dissemination of them, under the law; ... c) libraries, including university libraries, museums and archives. ... (3) If the public institutions referred to in par. ((2) lit. c) impose taxes, the total income obtained by making documents available and the authorization of their reuse in the corresponding accounting period does not exceed the cost of collection, preparation, reproduction, dissemination, preservation and obtaining authorization to use rights protected by rights, plus a profit that will not be more than 5% above the reference interest rate of the National Bank of Romania. ... (4) The fees provided in par. ((3) shall be established and calculated in accordance with the accounting principles applicable to the public institutions concerned, under conditions of transparency. ... ---------- Article 8 has been amended by section 6.6. 11 11 of art. I of LAW no. 299 299 of 25 November 2015 , published in MONITORUL OFFICIAL no. 898 898 of 3 December 2015. + Article 9 (1) Public institutions must ensure conditions for facilitating access to documents available through the publication of available document lists and the designation of persons responsible for their access and reuse. ... (2) In order to facilitate access and search for documents provided in electronic and machinable format automatically, under the conditions of art. 7, public institutions must publish the documents provided in par. (1) and on the government data portal open-data.gov.ro-, together with the relevant metadata, in compliance with its rules of use. ... (3) As far as possible, public institutions shall facilitate access and search in several languages of documents. ... (4) The documents provided in par. ((1) may be uploaded by public institutions and on the website of the institution or on portal sites with links to the data lists, while indicating information points. ... ---------- Article 9 has been amended by section 6.6. 12 12 of art. I of LAW no. 299 299 of 25 November 2015 , published in MONITORUL OFFICIAL no. 898 898 of 3 December 2015. + Article 9 ^ 1 ((1) In the case of fees for the reuse of documents held by public institutions, any applicable condition and the actual amount of those fees, including the basis for calculating these fees are predetermined and published by electronic means or whenever possible and appropriate, including on the website of the institution. ... (2) In the case of other fees for reuse than those provided in par. ((1), the public institution concerned shall indicate in advance the factors which are taken into account in the calculation of the duties in question. On request, the public institution concerned shall also indicate how such charges were calculated in relation to that request for reuse. ... (3) The requirements provided in art. 8 8 para. ((3) and (4) are predetermined. They shall be published by electronic means whenever possible and appropriate, including on the website of the institution. ... (. Public institutions shall ensure that persons addressing requests for reuse of documents are informed of the remedies available for decisions or practices concerning them. ... ---------- Article 9 ^ 1 has been introduced by item 1. 13 13 of art. I of LAW no. 299 299 of 25 November 2015 , published in MONITORUL OFFICIAL no. 898 898 of 3 December 2015. + Article 10 (1) The reuse of documents must be free for all natural and legal persons, even if they already exploit new products on the market obtained on the basis of these documents. Contracts or other agreements concluded between public institutions holding documents and third parties shall not provide exclusive rights. ... ((2) The reuse of information from public institutions may be subject to an agreement on the granting of an exclusive right only if such a right is necessary for the conduct of a public service. The validity of the reason for which the exclusive right has been granted is periodically re-examined and, in any case, every 3 years, the granting of this right cannot, by cumulation, exceed the maximum range of 10 years. ... (3) Exclusive agreements concluded under the conditions of par. (2), must be transparent and made public by any means, as well as on the website of the public institution concerned. ... ((. Without prejudice to paragraph 1. ((1), where an exclusive right concerns the digitisation of cultural resources in the public sector, the period of exclusivity shall not exceed 10 years. Where that period exceeds 10 years, the duration of that period shall be reviewed during the 11th year and thereafter, if applicable, every 7 years. ... (5) The agreements establishing the exclusive rights referred to in par. (4) shall be transparent and shall be made public. ... (6) If there is an exclusive right referred to in par. ((4), the public institution concerned shall receive, free of charge, as part of those agreements, a copy of the digitised cultural resources. That copy shall be available for reuse upon expiry of the exclusivity period. ... ---------- Article 10 has been amended by section 10. 14 14 of art. I of LAW no. 299 299 of 25 November 2015 , published in MONITORUL OFFICIAL no. 898 898 of 3 December 2015. + Article 11 (1) The present law shall enter into force on 60 days from the date of publication in the Official Gazette of Romania, Part I. ... ---------------- Alin. ((2) of art. 11 11 has been repealed by section 6.6. 7 7 of art. I of LAW no. 213 213 of 24 October 2008 , published in MONITORUL OFFICIAL no. 737 737 of 30 October 2008. + Article 12 (1) Every 3 years, the Ministry of Communications and the Information Society shall submit to the European Commission a report on public sector information available for reuse, the conditions under which those information are made available. information and practices in relation to remedies. On the basis of that report, which is made public, public institutions shall undertake a review, as regards the application of art. 8, especially regarding the imposition of taxes above the marginal cost; before the presentation to the European Commission, the report will be sent for information to the specialized committees of the Senate and the Chamber of Deputies. ... (2) In order to elaborate the report referred to in paragraph (1), public sector institutions have the obligation to submit annually to the Ministry for Information Society the requested information. ... ---------- Article 12 has been introduced by the 15 15 of art. I of LAW no. 299 299 of 25 November 2015 , published in MONITORUL OFFICIAL no. 898 898 of 3 December 2015. * This law transposes Directive no. 2003 2003 /98/EC on the re-use of public sector information published in the Official Journal of the European Union no. L345 of 31 December 2003. This law was adopted by the Romanian Parliament, under the conditions of art. 77 77 para. (2), in compliance with art. 75 75 and art. 76 76 para. (2) of the Romanian Constitution, republished. CHAMBER OF DEPUTIES PRESIDENT BOGDAN OLTEANU SENATE PRESIDENT NICOLAE VACAROIU Bucharest, April 25, 2007. No. 109. -----
