ACCESSING COMPANY REGISTERS
USING THE RIGHT TO KNOW

ONLY 1 OUT OF 32 EUROPEAN COUNTRIES ALLOWS FREE, PUBLIC
ACCESS TO ITS ENTIRE COMPANY REGISTER

0

countries were sent requests for a copy of the entire company register database

0

countries refused access to their company register database in its entirety

0

countries charge money for access to the company registers database

0

countries give free, public access to the entire company registers database

THE FINDINGS

RECOMMENDATIONS

European governments, by putting these obstacles to accessing company register data, are complicit in blocking investigative journalists in their work uncovering criminal activities, money laundering, and tax evasion.

Helen Darbishire, continue reading...

Recommendations

Company registers in Europe should be fully accessible to the public, free of charge and in open data formats.

The right of access to information should apply in full to the bodies holding company registers and to the registers themselves.

Registers should enable and facilitate searches for company information record-by-record, for free.

Registers should include and make available to the public information on the beneficiary owners of companies.

Privacy policies should always be applied consistently and it should not be possible to override supposed privacy considerations by simply paying for the information.

TWEET YOUR SUPPORT!

Experts’ views

Why is it important for the public to have full, free access to company registers?

Users perspective on access to company registers:

The Findings

The map below summarises the results of the request process, which took almost two years to complete.

To find out more about what happened in each country, click on the map or use the country-by-country list below:

Map Key
In red…Refused access to info
In orange…Process still ongoing
In green…Gave full access to info
In blue…Administrative silence

How did we get this information?

How long did we wait for responses?

Why were we refused access?

How much do they want us to pay?

Cover photo: Vater_fotografo via Flick (CC BY-SA 2.0)

OPEN COMPANY REGISTERS LATEST NEWS

1Jun 2010

Reform of Access to Information Laws in Bosnia and Herzegovina, Croatia and Montenegro

Anti-corruption organisations call for reform of Access to Information Laws in Bosnia and Herzegovina, Croatia and Montenegro Sarajevo, 1 June 2010: Faced with a chronic lack of transparency in the region, leading anti-corruption organisations today called for urgent reform of the access to information laws of Bosnia and Herzegovina, Croatia and Montenegro. The call by Transparency International BiH, Transparency International