1.3 What is personal data?

Personal data  is all information about an identified or identifiable natural person. In addition to data with obvious 'identification data', such as name and date of birth, this also includes genetic, biometric, location and online data that is unique to a person (such as an email address or IP address). In addition, a combination of variables can ensure that people can be identified.

Special categories of personal data (sensitive personal data)  are personal data  containing information  about race, ethnic origin, political views, religious or philosophical beliefs, trade union membership, genetic data, biometric data, health data, data about a person's sexual behavior or sexual focus. If this information becomes publicly available (eg as a result of a data breach), this can have very adverse consequences for those involved.

Pseudonymised personal data  (referred to as 'encrypted data' in the Belgian Privacy Act of 1992) are personal data (sensitive or not) that can only be associated with an identified or identifiable person by means of a non-public (secret) key. Pseudonymised personal data remains personal data protected by the GDPR.

With  anonymised personal data  , the possibilities for identification were 'irreversibly' removed by means of a processing technique. Attention, anonymous personal data that can be traced back to the original individuals with a reasonable effort, remain personal data and are not anonymous data and therefore fall under the AVG. For that reason, it is difficult for many types of research data (eg qualitative data) to completely anonymize it.

Anonymous data  is information that cannot be associated with an identified or identifiable person. Anonymous data is therefore not personal data and does not fall under the GDPR.