EN Official Journal of the European Union L 312/1

COMMISSION REGULATION (EU) No 1097/2010

of 26 November 2010

implementing Regulation (EC) No 177/2008 of the European Parliament and of the Council establishing a common framework for business registers for statistical purposes, as regards the exchange of confidential data between the Commission (Eurostat) and central banks

(Text with EEA relevance)

THE EUROPEAN COMMISSION,

Having regard to the Treaty on the Functioning of the European Union,

Having regard to Regulation (EC) No 177/2008 of the European Parliament and of the Council of 20 February 2008 establishing a common framework for business registers for statistical purposes and repealing Council Regulation (EEC) No 2186/93 (1), and in particular Article 12 thereof,

Whereas:

(1) Regulation (EC) No 177/2008 establishes a new common framework for business registers exclusively for statistical purposes in order to maintain the development of business registers in a harmonised framework.

(2) An exchange of confidential data between the Commission and national central banks, and between the Commission and the European Central Bank, exclusively for statistical purposes, should help ensure the quality of multinational enterprise group information in the European Union. It is therefore necessary to establish the format, the security and confidentiality measures and the procedure for the transmission of such confidential data to national central banks and the European Central Bank, to ensure that the data transmitted is used exclusively for statistical purposes.

(3) In accordance with Council Regulation (EC) No 2533/98 of 23 November 1998 concerning the collection of statistical information by the European Central Bank (2), data that the ESCB members have received from ESS authorities should be used exclusively for statistical purposes. The ESCB members should also ensure the physical and logical protection of confidential statistical information provided by the ESS authorities. The ECB should publish annual confidentiality reports on the measures adopted to safeguard the confidentiality of this statistical information.

(4) To ensure consistency, the data sets transmitted in accordance with this Regulation should use the same naming conventions, structures, and definition of fields as referred to in Commission Regulation (EC) No 192/2009 of 11 March 2009 implementing Regulation (EC) No 177/2008 of the European Parliament and of the Council establishing a common framework for business registers for statistical purposes, as regards the exchange of confidential data between the Commission (Eurostat) and Member States (3).

(5) The measures provided for in this Regulation are in accordance with the opinion of the European Statistical System Committee,

HAS ADOPTED THIS REGULATION:

Article 1

Format

1. The format set out in part A of the Annex shall be used for the data transmitted under Article 12(2) of Regulation (EC) No 177/2008.

2. The data and metadata shall be transmitted in accordance with the standards of the European Statistical System and with the structure defined in the most recent version of the Eurostat Business Registers Recommendations Manual available from the Commission (Eurostat).

Article 2

Confidentiality measures

The characteristics specified in part B of the Annex, including confidentiality flags, may be transmitted, for statistical purposes only, by the Commission (Eurostat) to the national central banks and the European Central Bank, provided that the transmission is explicitly authorised by the appropriate national authority and that, in the case of data transmitted to a national central bank, at least one unit of a multinational enterprise group is located in the territory of the Member State of that national central bank.

Article 3

Security measures

1. Any transmission of confidential data under this Regulation to ESCB members shall take place only after the ESCB members, within their respective spheres of competence, have taken the necessary measures in line with Article 8a and 8b of Regulation (EC) No 2533/98 to ensure:

— the protection of this data, in particular the storage of data that has been flagged as confidential in a secure area with restricted and controlled access,

— that the data are used exclusively for statistical purposes,

— that information on the measures has been included in the annual confidentiality report referred to in Article 8b of Regulation (EC) No 2533/98 or national central banks or the European Central Bank have informed the Commission (Eurostat) and the appropriate national authorities of the measures by other means.

2. The data shall be transmitted in an encrypted form.

Article 4

Procedure for transmission

1. The data and metadata transmitted pursuant to this Regulation shall be exchanged in electronic form.

2. The data and metadata shall be transmitted via the secure medium used by the Commission (Eurostat) for the transmission of confidential data, or via a secured remote access.

Article 5

This Regulation shall enter into force on the 20th day following its publication in the Official Journal of the European Union.

This Regulation shall be binding in its entirety and directly applicable in all Member States. Done at Brussels, 26 November 2010. For the Commission The President José Manuel BARROSO

(1) OJ L 61, 5.3.2008, p. 6.

(2) OJ L 318, 27.11.1998, p. 8.

(3) OJ L 67, 12.3.2009, p. 14.