Article 29 — Processing under the authority of the controller or processor

GDPR, Regulation (EU) 2016/679

What does GDPR Article 29 say?

Short answer, straight from the official text

The processor and any person acting under the authority of the controller or of the processor, who has access to personal data, shall not process those data except on instructions from the controller, unless required to do so by Union or Member State law.

Source: GDPR, Regulation (EU) 2016/679, read 2026-08-14.

In the actEU 2016/679
ChapterIV · Controller and processor
CELEX32016R0679
Read on2026-08-14

Official text

Read from the EU Publications Office for this CELEX number. The wording stands as published; nothing here is rewritten or summarised.

The processor and any person acting under the authority of the controller or of the processor, who has access to personal data, shall not process those data except on instructions from the controller, unless required to do so by Union or Member State law.

Open the article on EUR-Lex

Other articles in this chapter

The same rule in other acts

These articles carry the same official heading. The wording is not identical; read each text at its own source.

Who does this apply to

The register names five roles. Open a role to see the duties this act places on it, each row with its article and its source.

Does this apply to us?

All roles in the register · All questions by role

The text is quoted from the official source and is not legal advice. A national court reads the language version that binds in its jurisdiction.

Back to the act · EU acts, read down to the national law

ExploreWorldAI is operated by Valkiv Ventures AB (Reg. no. 556995-1311), Kungsgatan 8, 111 43 Stockholm, Sweden. EU-hosted, with data processing assessed against the GDPR. Contact: hello@exploreworldai.com.

Machine-readable summaries for AI agents: /llms.txt and /llms-full.txt.