Criminal Records Become Public
Criminal records will be made public at the beginning of 2012, and will be transferred from the Interior Ministry's authority to the Justice Ministry.
Running background checks will become easier, as a website will be created for accessing criminal histories. To conduct a search, one must know the individual's full name and national identification number. The service will cost four euros per inquiry, and people will also be able to see who has searched for their records.
Currently, searching for conviction records can be a hassle. Although court rulings are in the public domain, the same information provided by criminal records has so far been undisclosed.
"Court decisions for misdemeanor and criminal cases do not fall under the category of delicate personal information, according to the law [...] For that reason, it is in no way justifiable that court decisions are public information, but access to this information in criminal records is not," said Justice Minister Kristen Michal.
Some data will still be withheld from the public information system, including the records of minors and misdemeanors fined less than 200 euros.
Ott Tammik