Luxembourg¶
The Luxembourg case shows a transparency measure narrowed in the name of privacy, and the archive moving from public view to a circle of trusted readers. The balance the Union’s court struck protects individuals from exposure and, with them, the owners the register was built to reveal. What the financial centre’s institutions do with what they can still see depends on who asks, and on a habit of accommodation.
The clerk’s briefs¶
From the clerks, for the Patrician’s eyes
A minute of his Lordship’s time. Journalists, campaigners and others outside the authorised circle lose a way of tracing who owns what, and the owners regain a measure of quiet. Banks and authorities keep access, so those who decide whether a customer keeps an account, or whether a request from abroad is answered, still know whom they are dealing with. A rule reopening access to those with a legitimate interest, the press among them, would restore some of the public’s view.
November 2022: Open access ends¶
On 22 November 2022 the EU Court of Justice, in cases brought against the Luxembourg Business Registers, declared invalid the provision of the Anti-Money Laundering Directive by which the general public had nearly unrestricted access to data on the beneficial owners of companies. The register still operates; under current guidance its data can be consulted except personal data, and restricted records are open only to national authorities, lending and financial institutions, bailiffs and notaries. The clerks note that a register built to expose hidden owners was found to expose too much of everyone else.