News
Press releases
Events
The last five databases
Find & tools
The FPB offers several tools for searching the website: search engine, sitemap, JEL classification and keywords. In addition, this section also shows information on the use of cookies, our user charter and the possibility to file a complaint.
The ‘Privacy’ note outlines the policy of the Federal Planning Bureau with regard to the protection of private life with respect to the processing of data of the persons who visit our websites and our premises, and the citizens whose data is used as input for the studies and activities required for the execution of the tasks of the Federal Planning Bureau.
The Federal Planning Bureau observes the fundamental principles governing the processing of personal data:
The Federal Planning Bureau respects your rights as a data subject.
In principle, you have the right to access, complete, correct, delete your stored personal data and object to processing.
You can exercise your rights via contact@plan.be or, if necessary, receive a copy in CSV format. You will be informed by e-mail of the follow-up to your request.
None of your data will be communicated to third parties, either in the European Union or elsewhere in the world.
The IP address of the equipment used to login to our websites or send us an email is recorded automatically. Other information on the device you use and your web browsing behaviour is also registered (country, language, operator, OEM, access time, requested page, and referring Web site address). These records are part of the normal operation and of the logging of the servers (including web and mail) and of the firewalls, for example to enable our servers to give you the content of the requested pages.
The logging is used to monitor the smooth operation of the servers, to detect abnormal or unlawful activity on our websites or to provide statistics on the visits to our webpages.
The Federal Planning Bureau uses cookies on its websites for technical purposes only, for example to record your language preferences, so that you don’t need to repeat the same actions at each visit to our website.
Three cookies are recorded by the Federal Planning Bureau: a session cookie, an opt-in cookie for acceptance and a language preference cookie.
A banner informs you of the cookies but does not allow them to deactivate them because they are necessary for navigation on the website.
Cookies do not contain any information making it possible to contact you by phone, email or post.
The Federal Planning Bureau does not use cookies, beacons or other tracking technologies for commercial, direct marketing or profiling purposes.
To allow you to interact with other websites for which you have an account (such as LinkedIn and other social media websites), we can provide links or integrate third-party applications enabling you to log on to them, post content to them, or join communities of our websites on them.
We can also provide you with general links to third-party websites or applications.
The use of these links and applications is subject to the privacy policies of the visited websites. It is up to you to become familiar with these policies.
Statistics on visits to the websites of the Federal Planning Bureau (audience analysis) are produced by a third-party web analytics named Matomo.
The Federal Planning Bureau proposes company pages on the social networks LinkedIn, X and Youtube. Personal data such as cookies may be collected by these social networks when you interact in some ways (a “share” or a “like” for example). The Federal Planning Bureau doesn’t outsource any personal data processing - such as profiling for example - to these social networks.
When exchanging emails with the Federal Planning Bureau or its staff, third-party email addresses may, according to the need or voluntariness, be recorded by the individual email clients program of your contact persons. These email addresses are only used for the exchange of professional emails between the parties involved in the email exchanges.
The Federal Planning Bureau keeps a record of visitors to 1) keep track of the visitors accessing the premises of the Federal Planning Bureau so as to ensure the security of goods, data and persons present at the Federal Planning Bureau and 2) generate anonymous statistical data on the means of transport used by our visitors.
After your visit has been confirmed by the person expecting you, the receptionist records your details in the visitors register. These details include your surname, first name, company or organisation, time of arrival and departure, and the surname and first name of the member of staff receiving you. If you give your consent, the means of transport you used will also be noted.
The visitors register book contains the information required by the GDPR.
The Federal Planning Bureau works with Flexmail as a processor for the sending of newsletters and mailings. The personal data available to the Federal Planning Bureau and Flexmail for this activity are the surname, email address, language, occupational category, and preferences for mailing categories (press releases, publications, databases, vacancies, events, and news concerning our work and services).
The registration page of the distribution list available on the website of the Federal Planning Bureau contains one or more mailing categories you may tick, by which you agree to your data being used to send the corresponding mailings by e-mail. These data are not used for another purpose.
You can withdraw your consent at any time by unsubscribing to one or more mailing categories. You can manage this yourself via the unsubscribe button at the bottom of each e-mail or on simple request by e-mail to contact@plan.be. You can also exercise your other rights through contact@plan.be.
The Federal Planning Bureau stores partners and suppliers contact details in a purchase order database for the purpose of the performance of contracts. These data are regularly updated by the Federal Planning Bureau.
In order to ensure the security of goods, data and persons present at the federal Planning Bureau, a video surveillance system has been installed.
There are cameras on the ground floor (partial view on Belliardstraat/Rue Belliard), in the garden (at the back of the building) and at the IT room (5th floor). The retention period of the images in the registration system is 15 days. Images that can be used as evidence of an act that may have legal consequences may be stored longer. The videos may only be seen by authorised employees of the Federal Planning Bureau, justice, police and the filmed subjects themselves. The surveillance cameras are reported to the police.
In performing its legal duties, the Federal Planning Bureau is led to process personal data of citizens or samples of citizens for the purpose of scientific and statistical studies.
In most cases, the Federal Planning Bureau itself does not collect citizens’ personal data. It collects them from certain primary sources (such as the national statistical office (Statbel) and the crossroads banks of enterprises (KBO/BCE) and social security (KSZ/BCSS)) and performs subsequent data processing of a scientific and statistical nature in a manner deemed compatible with the primary purpose of the data collection.
Such processing falls within the scope of article 89 of the GDPR “Safeguards and derogations relating to processing for archiving purposes in the public interest, scientific or historical research purposes or statistical purposes” and within the scope of Title 4 of the Law of 30 July 2018 on the protection of individuals with regard to the processing of personal data.
The Federal Planning Bureau only provides and publishes aggregate and anonymous global data. The Federal Planning Bureau does not provide to third parties, export outside Belgium.
The Federal Planning Bureau is not a source of authentic individual data that can be used by a public service for its own tasks specific to the exercise of public authority.
The processing of personal data by the Federal Planning Bureau does not require direct identification of the data subjects. Data are pseudonymised at source and usually partly aggregated in such a way that the Federal Planning Bureau does not know the direct identifiers of the citizens concerned (such as name, first name, national register number, address, etc.), just as little as the keys. By way of exception, the identification data of self-employed persons can be known when the name and address of the enterprise in the KBO/BCE match the identifiers of the self-employed person.
In principle, the data are kept for as long as the legal mandates of the Federal Planning Bureau apply. In several cases, however, a specific time limit is agreed with the data supplier by which the data must be destroyed. This period is sufficient to carry out and complete the studies for which the data were obtained.
Based on the above, the Federal Planning Bureau is usually unable to identify the data subjects in the databases used in its scientific and statistical studies.
The rights of access, rectification and erasure of the data and the right to object processing could only be applied if the data subject provides additional information making it possible to identify him/her, in such a case the pseudonym identifying the data subject in the databases. The Federal Planning Bureau is not in a position to provide the citizen with additional information on this pseudonym. Moreover, any change or erasure of citizens’ data would have an adverse impact on the scientific or statistical work of the Federal Planning Bureau.
The elaboration and the calibration of statistical models and tools as well as their feeding and functioning do not allow considering any interaction at the level of individual data without seriously impeding the functioning of the tools, and therefore the processing. The rectification or erasure of some individual data would have an insignificant impact on model results, in such a way that the scientific interest of using the substantial technical and financial resources required to this end is not justified.
In the few cases where the Federal Planning Bureau does collect personal data itself, the individuals concerned can still exercise the rights granted to them by the GDPR. Even then, however, if altered or erased, the above-mentioned disadvantages for scientific and statistical work exist.
The Federal Planning Bureau cannot identify the data subjects occurring in most of its databases for its scientific or statistical studies and therefore cannot provide them information individually.
General information on the processing activities for scientific and statistical studies and their purposes is provided on the website of the Federal Planning Bureau (see the Index of the record of processing activities).
Similarly, in the event of a security breach requiring a “personal data breach communication to the data subject”, a general announcement will be published as soon as possible on the website of the Federal Planning Bureau (see the Communication of a personal data breach) and the GBA/APD will be notified in accordance with the regulatory provisions of the GDPR.
A general notice will be published on the website of the Federal Planning Bureau for any change in the personal data use policy.
For any question regarding privacy protection by the Federal Planning Bureau, please contact the Data protection officer whose contact details are given above.
NOTE:
The information was updated on 25 March 2024. We regularly check it to ensure correctness, but we cannot assure it is 100% accurate all the time.
Federal Planning Bureau
