Articles

Effects of COVID-19 Pandemic on Grace Periods and Use Obligation Provided for Trademarks in Turkey

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Trademarks and Designs || Güldeniz Doğan Alkan and Ayşenur Çıtak

Effects of Covid-19 pandemic on trademarks’ use requirement has been discussed globally and it is also a hot topic in Turkey. In order to discuss its effects, the grace periods provided for trademarks in the Turkish Industrial Property Code (“the IPC”) and justified reasons for non-use will be explained first. After giving an outline of the precautions taken against the Covid-19 pandemic in Turkey, we will provide our comments on the matter. General Information Regarding the ...»

Turkey’s New Data Storage and Transfer Requirements for Banks

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Data Protection and Privacy and Finance || Begüm Yavuzdoğan Okumuş and Direnç Bada

Amendments to Turkish Banking Law No. 5411 in February 2020 introduced important provisions regarding how banks handle confidential customer data. Based on these provisions, the Banking Regulation and Supervision Agency introduced a secondary regulation that was finalized in March, the Regulation on Banks’ Information Technology and Electronic Banking Services. This regulation contains binding provisions related to data processing and transferring of bank customers. Definitio...»

Restrictions on Dividend Distribution Extended to 31 December 2020

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Corporate and M&A || Görkem Bilgin and Ahmet Niyazi Ülkü

Within the scope of the fight against the Covid-19, the provisional article 13, which was added to the Turkish Commercial Code ("TCC") on April 16, 2020, brought some restrictions on the dividend distribution rights of equity companies until 30 September 2020 and the exemptions regarding the companies covered by the regulation, the procedures and principles in relation to the practice were determined by the Communiqué issued by the Ministry of Commerce ("Ministry") and publis...»

Product Liability and Safety 2020 in Turkey

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Dispute Management || Pelin Baysal and Ilgaz Önder

Sources of law 1. What are the main areas of law and regulation relating to product liability? Turkey does not currently have specific legislation on product liability. However, the Product Safety and Technical Regulations Law 7223, which will enter into force on 12 March 2021, introduces a specific liability regime. This answer refers both to the current law and to the new product liability regime under Law 7223. Product liability claims of a commercial nature are based mai...»

Data Controllers’ Registry (VERBIS)

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Data Protection and Privacy || Gün + Partners

Pursuant to Article 16 of the Data Protection Law, an obligation to register in the Data Controllers Registry has been introduced for data controllers. In 2018, the Board issued decisions granting exemptions from registration obligation to certain professional groups, associations and political parties. The Board also granted a general exemption to local data controllers that have less than 50 employees, and actively less than TRY 25 million on their balance sheets. Data cont...»

Data Breach Notification

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Data Protection and Privacy || Gün + Partners

The Data Protection Law requires data controllers to notify the relevant data subject and the Board as soon as possible when being made aware of such data breach. In its decision dated January 24, 2019 and numbered 2019/9, the Board clarified the rules and procedures to be applied in data breach incidents. The Board takes the GDPR approach in terms of timing of breach notifications, and clarified that the term of “as soon as possible” must be interpreted as 72 hours of becomi...»

Transfer of Data Abroad

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Data Protection and Privacy || Gün + Partners

Sensitive and non-sensitive personal data can be transferred abroad if the explicit consent of the data subject is obtained. Furthermore, other legal grounds will also apply to the transfer of personal data to the foreign country. However, the destination country must have “sufficient protection” in order to conclude the transfer abroad based on legal grounds (except for having obtained explicit consent). A list of jurisdictions that provide sufficient protection is to be det...»

Transfer of Data to Third Party

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Data Protection and Privacy || Gün + Partners

Sensitive and non-sensitive personal data can be transferred to third parties if the explicit consent of the data subject is obtained, or if one of the additional legal grounds is applicable for such transfer. The Data Protection Law does not provide a definition for a third party; therefore, any individual or entity (other than the data controller and the data subject) may be considered a third party. This creates a problem, especially in relation to transfers between data c...»

Explicit Consent under Data Protection Law

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Data Protection and Privacy || Gün + Partners

Explicit consent has been defined as consent that relates to a specified issue, declared by free will and based on information. The definition provides that not all kinds of consent will suffice under the Data Protection Law. The data subject must know for what he/she is providing consent, and must express his/her consent clearly. For example, consent obtained in English from non-English speakers in Turkey would not be considered to be explicit consent. Further, implied conse...»

Lawful Data Processing

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Data Protection and Privacy || Gün + Partners

Processing Personal Data In principle, personal data can be processed with the explicit consent of the data subject. On the other hand, personal data can be processed without explicit consent in the following circumstances: If processing is clearly proposed under the laws; If processing is mandatory for the protection of life, or to prevent the physical injury of a person, in cases where that person cannot express consent, or whose consent is legally invalid due to physical ...»

Application of the Data Protection Law

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Data Protection and Privacy || Gün + Partners

The Data Protection Law applies to data controllers who process and transfer personal data under their control. Furthermore, in the situation where data controllers utilise the services of third party data processors for these processes, the law holds them jointly liable for taking all of the technical and administrative measures required to ensure the safeguarding of personal data and to prevent any unlawful access or processing. The Data Protection Law does not envisage the...»

Data Protection Law in General

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Data Protection and Privacy || Gün + Partners

On April 7, 2016, a new law on the protection of personal data came into force in Turkey: The Law on the Protection of Personal Data numbered 6698 (“Data Protection Law”). It is the first law of its kind in Turkey, specifically regulating the protection of personal data. The Data Protection Law is a step towards harmonizing Turkish legislation with EU legislation, and it was prepared based on Directive 95/46/EC on data protection (“Data Protection Directive”). The Data Protec...»