Social Code Book X, Transmission of Social Data Abroad and to International Organizations

The social secrecy of section 35 of the First Book, which section 77 reaches, binds the social benefit carriers and, among others, their associations and the Deutsche Post AG where it is entrusted with calculating or paying social benefits. Social data may be transmitted to persons or bodies in other EU member states, and in states treated as equal to them, where necessary for a statutory task of the transmitting body or of a foreign body with matching tasks, among other listed grounds.

The transmission does not take place where it would conflict with the principles in Article 6 of the Treaty on European Union. Paragraph 1 applies by analogy to a third country or international organization whose adequate level of data protection an adequacy decision under Article 45 of the General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) has established.

Without an adequacy decision, transmission of social data to a third country or an international organization is inadmissible, departing from Article 46 paragraph 2 letter a and Article 49 paragraph 1 first subparagraph letter g of the GDPR.

A transmission for important reasons of public interest exists only where international social security agreements are applied, or the conditions of section 69 paragraph 1 numbers 1 and 2 or section 70 are met and the data subject has no protectable interest in excluding it. The body that receives the social data must be told the purpose for which it is transmitted.