Law on Information About Private Life, localization and cross-border transfer

Law No. 519-V (20 March 2017), Arts. 12, 17

A citation is an address, not a summary. The first part names the law; what follows narrows it to the exact section, article or paragraph.

What follows is LexLint's own research summary of this law, not legal advice.

In force since 1 July 2017.

A cross border transfer rule binding public and private bodies.

As of 29 August 2026.

What it requires

An app storing or processing the personal information of individuals in Turkmenistan, including a voiceprint or other biometric identifier, must maintain a database located within Turkmenistan; only data contained in that domestic database may be transferred abroad at all. Transfer to another country additionally requires that the destination ensure protection of personal information, or one of four fallback grounds: written consent, a ratified treaty, statutory necessity, or protection of vital interests or constitutional rights where consent cannot be obtained.

What this law does

Drafted with AI from the cited sources under the direction of UnGovr staff. UnGovr holds editorial responsibility for this page.

Art. 12(2) is an unconditional domestic-storage duty, with no citizen-only qualifier and no sectoral limitation: storage of personal information is carried out in a database of personal information located in the territory of Turkmenistan. Art. 17, read in full, makes the domestic database an explicit precondition for any transfer, not merely an alternative to it: personal information is subject to cross-border transfer only where it is contained in a database located in Turkmenistan.

Transfer to a state ensuring protection is then permitted; where the destination does not, transfer may still occur on written subject consent, a ratified treaty, statutory necessity, or protection of vital interests or constitutional rights where consent cannot be obtained. No enforcement history for either duty was found; secondary reporting describes practical enforcement of this Act generally as essentially nonexistent.

When LexLint raises it

crawls_web
trains_models
deploys_chatbot
processes_biometrics
processes_voice

Read the law

official text, Human Rights Ombudsman of Turkmenistan (converted from the site's RTF publication)

Every line above is drawn from the primary source linked here, read on the date shown. This is a research summary, not legal advice.

Back to the example · Lint your app