25th Anniversary of the Act on Access to Public Information – Conference

On 4 September 2026, an online conference entitled “25 Years Since the Adoption of the Act on Access to Public Information – Specific Features of the Practice of Interpreting and Applying the Current Provisions” will take place. The event is organised by three Polish universities: the Faculty of Law and Administration of the University of Łódź, the Faculty of Law, Administration and Economics of the University of Wrocław, and the Faculty of Law and Administration of the Cardinal Stefan Wyszyński University. The co‑organisers of the conference are the Personal Data Protection Office and the Social Team of Experts at the President of the Personal Data Protection Office.

The conference will focus on the application of the Act on Access to Public Information on the occasion of the 25th anniversary of its adoption. Despite a quarter of a century of its operation, interpretation of these provisions continues to raise numerous doubts, and reconciling the principle of transparency in public life with the protection of personal data remains challenging. Questions submitted to the Personal Data Protection Office—for example in the context of inspections of Public Information Bulletins or the implementation of the Central Register of Contracts—show that technological developments have, in fact, deepened these problems.

The event will open with an address by the President of the Personal Data Protection Office, Mirosław Wróblewski, followed by the first session entitled “The Meanders of the Practice of Interpreting and Applying the Provisions of the Act on Access to Public Information”. This panel will be devoted to practical experiences in applying the Act over the past 25 years. It will discuss the changes that have taken place in this legislation, as well as those planned or proposed but ultimately not enacted. The panel will also address the issue of abuse of the right to public information in light of recent case law of administrative courts, and the extra‑normative elements of concretising obligations in the context of the principles of legality and the rule of law. Speakers will also refer to the processing of personal data in Public Information Bulletins and access to information in the Central Register of Contracts.

The second session will focus on current and future challenges related to access to public information.

Speakers will seek to explain, among other things, how technology has changed access to public information, what challenges arise from the development of artificial intelligence in this context, and they will discuss issues related to making data available on the portal and the question of the image of a person performing a public function.

An expert discussion is planned after the presentations.

All interested parties are invited to participate online; no prior registration is required. A link to the broadcast will be published on the day of the conference at www.uodo.gov.pl.