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This is one of series of country reports prepared for the Council of Europe in 2015. Other countries' reports, and responses from national governments, are available here. The studies undertake to present the laws and, in so far as information is easily available, the practices concerning the filtering, blocking and takedown of illegal content on the internet.

(1) According to the Law on Electronic Communications (LEC), Information Service Providers (ISPs) are obliged to guarantee the confidentiality of communications by undertaking all the necessary technical and organizational measures. (2) The LEC provides for a data retention regime, which is only available to criminal enforcement authorities for serious crimes and computer crimes. Under Article 13(2) of LEC “the information shall not be stored for any period longer than the one that is reasonably necessary for the transmission." Public authorities may rely also on the disclosure provisions in the Code of Criminal Procedure. (3) ISPs are not supposed to disclose any information unless it is requested by the court, in connection to a particular civil, criminal or administrative case. Law on Electronic Commerce (LEC) does...

(1) The Bulgarian online media companies Net Info and V Box—Bulgaria's largest video sharing portal—filed a complaint with the Competition Protection Commission (CPC) against Google and its video portal YouTube. The plaintiff claimed that Google violated Articles 29 and 36, para.1 of the Law on Protection of Competition. Article 29 states that “Any action or omission when carrying out economic activity, which is contrary to good faith commercial practices and damages or may damage the interests of competitors shall be prohibited.” Article 36 (1) provides that “Carrying out unfair competition, aimed at soliciting clients, as a result of which existing agreements are terminated or breached, or entry into such agreements with competitors is prevented, shall be prohibited.”) (2) The complaint was prompted by the fact that...

(1) Plaintiff sent internet users unsolicited bulk e-mail, commonly known as "spam," to promote its internet business and website. The recipients of these unsollicited communications filled complaints with the Consumer Protection Commission (CPC) under Art.6 (3) Law on Electronic Commerce (LEC) against the website, without knowing the identity of the website owner.The CPC found that the domain eroticnetwork.bg is registered by a physical person who is also enlisted as an administrative and technical contact person. (2) The plaintiff claimed that he is not to be considered as an ISP, because he is a physical person and is not registered as a commercial entity under the Commercial Act. (3) The court considered Article 13 (1) of LEC stating that: “Upon providing access to or transmission trough electronic communication...

(1) The Consumer Protection Commission (CPC) was claiming that an ISP hosting a website with false and misleading real estate advertisements was engaging in unfair commercial practice contrary to Article 68d of Consumer Protection Act (CPA). (2) The court found that the investigation made by the administrative authority, the CPC, imposing penalties, was not sufficient to identify who committed the offence. It was not proven that the defendant should be regarded as an ISP at all. Some evidences may have led to the conclusion that the ISP was a hosting provider but it was never proved in the course of the investigation that he was acting in this capacity. (3) The simple listing of company names with references to websites with the same names, was considered as insufficient by the court to prove in a definitive way the...