Postal se­cre­cy and da­ta pro­tec­tion

Guaranteed postal secrecy

Anyone who provides postal services as a business or is actively involved in those services is obliged to maintain postal secrecy. Anyone with these obligations is prohibited from procuring, for themselves or for other parties, any information regarding the content or detailed circumstances of postal services beyond what is necessary for the provision of postal services.

Data protection

The guarantee of postal secrecy is supplemented by detailed regulations on data protection in postal services. Both areas have comparable protective functions. In addition to postal item content, data protection includes all personal data related to postal services (eg traffic data, delivery data, billing data and address data).

The Bundesnetzagentur has published a leaflet on postal secrecy and data protection as well as a template for a declaration of commitment to ensure postal secrecy compliance. Both documents are available for downloading at the bottom of this page.

Note:
The European General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) and the new Federal Data Protection Act (Bundesdatenschutzgesetz/BDSG) entered into force on 25 May 2018. The leaflet on postal secrecy and data protection linked under further information as well as the template for a declaration of commitment to ensure postal secrecy have been updated accordingly.

Contact

Postal secrecy
Bundesnetzagentur, Tulpenfeld 4, 53113 Bonn

Tel.: +49 228 14 - 2160
Fax: +49 228 14 - 6215

E-Mail: Postgeheimnis@bnetza.de

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