New data protection law in the Dominican Republic

The Dominican Republic recently enacted Law No 172-13 for the Protection of Personal Data (hereinafter “Law for Data Protection”). The law governs the protection of all personal data filed before public entities, and other data storage means, in order to assure that the privacy rights are duly protected, as well as to grant persons readier access to their own personal data. This law is of public order and applies nationally. The regulations for enforcement of said law have not yet been published.

The Law for Data Protection is of great importance as it introduces uniform rules concerning data protection in the Dominican legal framework. Prior to its enactment, the Dominican Republic had several norms applicable to specific sectors (for example, regulations applicable to personal data held by financial institutions and Law No. 288-05 on the Regulation of Credit Bureaus). 

The law also establishes the general principles that will apply to data protection, namely: the obligation that personal data will only be gathered when its use is appropriate, lawful and does not exceed the scope and explicit purpose of such use; prior consent of the consumer for holding and assigning personal data; and secrecy obligations.  Moreover, the law sets forth the norms governing the judicial action (known as “habeas data”, which is a constitutional right) that all consumers will have in order to have access to their personal data gathered in public or private databases.

The Law for Data Protection expressly abrogates Law No. 288-05 on the Regulation of Credit Bureaus, and establishes clearer obligations and rules that will apply to credit bureaus, the credit data gathered by such entities and the rights of consumers in respect of such data. The Law for Data Protection provides that all credit bureaus, data storage entities and financial entities will have a six months term to adapt their systems and structures to the terms of the Law for Data Protection. The law also provides that consumers will have the right to obtain, free of charge, copies of their credit report four times a year, subject to a minimum interval of three months between requests and to certain exceptions. Credit bureaus will be subject to supervision by the Superintendence of Banks of the Dominican Republic.