DPA case 12/2025 (municipality) – Dismissed (Belgium, 2025)

On 22 January 2025 the Belgian DPA’s Litigation Chamber issued merits decision 12/2025, DOS-2020-05957, dismissing a complaint against an anonymised municipality about fingerprint processing for an electronic identity card. The complainant objected to scanning eight fingers when only one print per hand was stored on the card. The Chamber accepted a statutory obligation as the Article 6(1)(c) legal basis and the technical process of selecting the best-quality print per hand, with the prescribed ranking, restricted access and temporary production storage not exceeding three months. It found no evidence of reuse for other purposes and no infringements of purpose limitation or data minimisation on this record. It recalled that Articles 12 and 13 require active information at collection, but the file did not establish what information the adult complainant received then; later correspondence from her father did not prove that she had herself made an Article 15 request. It did not establish a transparency or access infringement. Paragraph 28 and the visually inspected operative box on page 10 dismiss under Article 100(1)(1) WOG because no GDPR infringement could be established. No fine was imposed. This decision concerns the described statutory and technical safeguards; it is not an unrestricted approval of biometric collection or retention. The original source does not establish subsequent appeal or finality.