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Protection of Privacy Law, 5741-1981
Protection of Privacy Law 5741-1981: Israel
Prepared by Shubhank Suman · Last reviewed
Current: materially amended by Amendment No. 13
- Legal character
- National statute
- Region
- Middle East
What it covers
Israel's Protection of Privacy Law is the principal national law governing privacy and databases.
It regulates:
- personal information
- information databases
- collection and use
- access/correction
- information security
- database governance
- DPO requirements
- supervisory powers
- administrative and criminal enforcement.
Israel's Knesset legal database identifies the law as currently valid and records Amendment No. 13 as the latest direct amendment, published 14 August 2(Knesset)
Why it matters
Amendment No. 13 was a major structural reform.
The Privacy Protection Authority describes it as expanding the definition of personal information, establishing stronger administrative enforcement powers, introducing significant administrative fines and creating new DPO and database-management obligations (Gov.il)
Refer to it when
- Database governance
- information security
- biometric processing
- location/online identifiers
- DPO obligations
- database registration/notification
- privacy enforcement
- unauthorised processing
- security incidents.
AI, privacy and cybersecurity relevance
- AI: High
- Privacy: Very High
- Cyber: Very High
AI
High.
The law is not an AI Act, but the broadened definition of personal information captures categories heavily used by AI systems, including biometrics, location information and online identifiers. The Israeli PPA has also issued AI-specific privacy material separately, making the statute important to AI/privacy analysis.
Cybersecurity
Very High.
The statutory framework operates with the Privacy Protection Regulations (Data Security), 5777-2017, making security governance a major part of compliance.
Applicability
Public and private organisations operating databases/processing personal information within the Israeli framework.
Current validity
CURRENT: AS AMENDED BY AMENDMENT NO. 13.
The current Knesset record marks the law as valid, with Amendment 13 as the latest direct amendment (Knesset)
Read first
Definitions → database controller/holder → processing → security → DPO → registration/notification → enforcement → Amendment 13.
Provisions / sections covered
IMPORTANT CHANGES UNDER AMENDMENT 13
Expanded personal-information definition
"Personal information" now encompasses information relating to an identified or reasonably identifiable person, including identifiers such as:
- name
- ID number
- biometric identifier
- location information
- online identifier
- physical/health information
- economic/social/cultural information (Gov.il)
Expanded controller concept
The amended framework introduces/clarifies:
- database controller
- holder
- database manager.
A holder includes an external party processing information for the controller (Gov.il)
New processing concept
The amended law defines processing broadly to include collection, receipt, storage, copying, viewing, disclosure, transfer and access (Gov.il)
DPO
Amendment 13 creates a DPO requirement for specified public bodies and organisations conducting qualifying privacy-intensive activities. The PPA's published material states that the new DPO obligation entered into effect on 14 August 2(Gov.il)
Enforcement
The PPA now has materially expanded administrative enforcement powers, including statutory authority to impose administrative fines for breaches of the Privacy Protection Law and specified regulations (Gov.il)
The PPA's 2026 enforcement records show the amended regime being actively used, including a July 2026 administrative fine for a serious security incident (Gov.il)
Subject-matter tags
- Data breach
- Data protection officer
- Controller and processor
- Biometrics
- Health data
- Enforcement and penalties
- Registration and notification
Subject-matter tags describe what the indexed text discusses. They are not legal conclusions.
Document page in the Knowledge Base - full text or PDF where it is available for this record.
This library locates primary and official sources. It does not interpret the law and it is not legal advice.