Law: Law No. 81 of 10 October 2018 on Electronic Transaction and Personal Data (only available in Arabic here) (the Law)

Regulator: There is no general data protection authority.

Summary: While Law No. 81 of 10 October 2018 on Electronic Transaction and Personal Data (only available in Arabic here) (the Law) is not comprehensive data protection legislation when compared with international standards, it does establish the essential legal regime governing the protection of personal data in relation to any automatic or non-automatic processing activity in Lebanon. The Law does not establish an independent data protection authority, but it guarantees the Ministry of Economy and Trade a relevant role in the management of data processing activities since it must be notified of any intended data processing activity. The Law further includes specific privacy requirements in relation to data subjects' rights, transparency and information to be provided to data subjects, data retention periods, sensitive personal data, and appropriate security measures to be adopted by data controllers. Finally, the Law establishes certain criminal penalties for the violation of its privacy provisions.