Privacy and Personal Data Protection in Russia, Lithuania and Germany : Law, Legacy and Cyber Shift

The aim of research presented in this paper is to study the ideas and perceptions on digital-sphere related privacy, control and security in three different societies: Germany, Lithuania and Russia. The paper is investigating if –and if yes, how– the historical ideas and beliefs about privacy and personal data protection are still shaping the experiences, law, perceptions and behaviour in the digital word of these three different populations, united by similar historical experiences of living in non-democratic societies. As a mean of investigating the views and opinions on privacy and data protection in Germany, Lithuania and Russia, a pilot survey was designed and tested. It was combined with the analysis of legal sources. Combining the analysis of laws and legal documents with quantitative data, historical approaches with contemporary statistical analysis turned out to be a fruitful strategy to measure different approaches towards the privacy and data security in Russia, Germany and Lithuania. As the collected data demonstrate, we can raise the hypothesis that the legal regimes and privacy definitions of the past still impact today’s societies.