Database

The Directive 2000/31/EC (E-Commerce Directive) is the legal basis governing the liability of Internet Services Providers (ISPs) in the EU Member States and includes a conditional safe harbor. The Directive covers any type of infringement of third-party rights, including intellectual and industrial property rights and personality rights.

The limitations on liability in the Directive apply to clearly delimited activities (mere conduit, caching and hosting) carried out by internet intermediaries, rather than to categories of service providers or types of information. While it was not considered necessary to cover hyperlinks and search engines in the Directive, the Commission has encouraged Member States to further develop legal security for Internet intermediaries.

Since not all Member States have transposed the relevant articles consistently, the national case law is divergent and leads to legal insecurity on an EU level.

In Slovenia, the safe harbor regime is transposed almost verbatim into the Electronic Commerce Market Act. There are no specific statutory provisions that are able to provide a special liability basis for intermediaries. Therefore, their liability must be determined according to general rules.

Internet intermediaries are only liable for their own conduct which can be due to action or omission. Therefore, culpability is a necessary prerequisite for the establishment of extra-contractual liability for online intermediaries. On the other hand, according to case law, it is likely that internet intermediaries will be liable if they cannot establish a valid safe harbor defense.

The Privacy Act contains a specific requirement for the so-called “traceability of processing of personal data”. It requires that the data controller and data processor enable subsequent determination of when individual personal data were entered into a filing system, used or otherwise processed, and by whom (Art. 24).

In Slovenia, transfers of personal data to non-EEA and non-whitelist countries require the approval of the Commissioner. The approval is issued if the Commissioner establishes that a sufficient level of protection is ensured for the transferring of personal data respectively for the data subjects to which this data relates.

For intra-corporate transferees (ICT), there is a limitation of stay of one year. For contractual service providers (CSS) and Independent service providers (ISS), there is a limitation of stay of three months.

The government of Slovenia owns 62.54% of Telekom Slovenije, the incumbent telecommunications operator.

In the European Union, there is no general principle for the use of copyright protected material comparable to the fair use/fair dealing principle in the US. Directive 2001/29/EC defines an optional, but exhaustive set of limitations from the author´s exclusive rights under the control of the “three-step test”. This is a clause in the Berne Convention that establishes three cumulative conditions to the limitations and exceptions of a copyright holder’s rights. The Directive has been transposed by Member States with significant freedom.

The Slovenian Copyright Act has traditionally governed limitations on copyright law narrowly, but it also provides the three-step-test. In 2004, the Act was amended to implement only few of the non-mandatory provisions of the Directive 2001/29/EC.

It is reported that the right of access to public procurement is limited to regional trade agreement partners and members of the WTO’s Government Procurement Agreement.

Concerns have been raised that the public procurement process in Slovenia is non-transparent. Furthermore, other complaints include short time frames for bid preparation, a lack of clarity in tendering documentation and opacity in the bid evaluation process.

One complaint involves the quasi-judicial National Revision Commission (NRC), which reviews all disputed public procurement cases. The NRC has extraordinary powers to review, amend, and cancel tenders, and its decisions are not subject to judicial appeal.

There also are concerns that the NRC favors EU, and especially Slovenian, firms under its “national interest” standard.

The European Regulation No. 1042/2013 amending the Council Implementing Regulation No. 282/2011, declares that from January 2015, all supplies of telecommunications, broadcasting and electronic services will be taxable at the place where the customer belongs. These include, inter alia:
- images or text, such as photos, screensavers, e-books and other digitised documents e.g. PDF files;
- music, films and games, including games of chance and gambling games, and of programmes on demand;
- online magazines website supply or web hosting services distance maintenance of programmes and equipment;
- supplies of software and software updates advertising space on a website.

Both EU and non-EU suppliers have to register for VAT purposes and comply with the relevant obligations of the Member State where the customer is established, has his/her permanent address or usually resides. This may be burdensome as there are 81 VAT rates across the 28 EU countries and the rates may vary between 3% (Luxembourg) to 27% (Hungary) across member states. Furthermore, member states impose varying thresholds at which companies must begin paying VAT, ranging from EUR 0 to EUR 60,000.

As an alternative to obtaining multiple VAT registrations in each Member State where a supplier has a customer, affected suppliers may be able to opt to account for VAT across the EU via a a web-portal in the Member State in which they are identified. Hence, the system, known as the Mini One-Stop Shop (MOSS) scheme, allows taxable persons to avoid registering in each Member State of consumption.

The EU Copyright Directive allows “fair compensation” for copyright owners. As a result, several Member States have imposed national levy systems.

In Slovenia, it is reported that in 2010 and 2011, there was no collection of copyright duties, despite good legal basis. Zavod IPF, who was holding a provisional licence until 2009 to collect the duty for performers and producers of phonograms, was blocked by the authors’ society, and afterwards the whole system collapsed. As of today, no new licenses have been issued. Nevertheless, in 2017, it was reported that duties were still being collected, and that they equalled EUR 164,000 in 2015.

Theoretically, the following duties apply:
- Minidisc: EUR 0.13 per 90 minutes.
- Data CD-R/RW: EUR 0.03 per GB (max EUR 16.69).
- HD-DVD: EUR 0.03 per GB (max EUR 16.69).

For devices the following levies apply:
- MP3 players: EUR 4.17 < 2 GB and 8.35 EUR > 2 GB.
- Computer hard disc: EUR 0.03 per GB (max EUR 16.69).
- Blu Ray recorder (external): EUR 6.26 per unit.
- USB stick: EUR 0.03 Per GB (max EUR 16.69).

Registration of a .sk domain name is only allowed to Slovakian residents or to companies with a local presence.

The European de minimis threshold for import duties is harmonized. Goods with a value of up to 128 SDR / 150 EUR / 186 USD are exempted from customs duties. The VAT de minimis threshold is not harmonized within the EU and can vary between 10 and 22 EUR, i.e. Member States can decide on a value within this range to grant an exemption on VAT for imported goods.

According to Slovakia's de minimis rule, goods with a value of up to 19 SDR / 22 EUR / 27 USD are exempted from VAT.

The EU Directive on Audiovisual Media Services (AVMS) covers traditional broadcasting services as well as audiovisual media services provided on-demand, including via the Internet. Article 13 of the Directive imposes on Member States the obligation to ensure that on-demand service providers promote European works, despite there is no explicit content quota. The Directive has been implemented by Member States in different ways, ranging from very extensive and detailed measures to a mere reference to the general obligation to promote European works.

In Slovakia, Article 13 has been implemented by imposing on video-on-demand (VOD) providers the obligation to reserve a share of European works in their catalogue.

The implementation of the EU Directive on Audiovisual Media Services (AVMS) gave Rada prevysielanie a retransmisiu (RVR), which is the Council for Broadcasting and Retransmission, the competence to regulate certain types of online video content. The implementation was considered by several media experts and media outlets as too strict.

The main problem is the unclear definition as to which online services can be subject to the regulation. The main criteria for the inclusion of on-demand services (OVD) are that they are provided on a commercial basis (e.g. there is advertising on the website) and they are organized in a catalog, which can refer to any website section containing videos of the respective media outlet.

RVR can impose fines if it finds that video content does not comply with standards for child protection, depiction of violence, hate speech, profanity, etc. Online video also has to contain information about the minimum recommended age for viewers.

RVR used the law’s provisions for the first time in April 2011 when it warned Mac TV for a broadcast titled “Academia destructiva–Televízor” that was aired on its website (Huste.tv). RVR reasoned that Mac TV had violated the provision on protection of minors by restricting the broadcast for the lowest-age category of viewers under 15, because it believed that the broadcast should have been restricted for minors under 18 as it contained a large amount of profanities.

A survey carried out by the telecom regulator in 2012 showcased that some end users reported that they have experienced slowing down the speed, blocking or degradation of the Internet service or applications by their service provider.