In judgment of September 2018 ECLI:NL:STAINLESS STEEL:2018:2856 of the Council of State it concerns the granting of authorisations to operators for the operation of window prostitution businesses. In doing so, they shall requirements such as registering sex workers and administering intake reports. The question is whether recording the appeal and additional information are special personal data. I find this an interesting question because it's not about the special personal data that can be directly inferred, but reasoning and concluding. I take texts from the verdict.
In his defense, the mayor believes that the work of an sex worker consists of performing sexual acts, but that this doesn't say anything about the personal sex life or the personal orientation of a sex worker. In the intake interview, operators must ask with the aim of determining whether the sex worker does the work voluntarily but they may not ask questions about, for example, health, addiction or cognitive ability. This information would then be immediately available as special personal data. The work itself is a legal profession. It appears from the explanatory memorandum to the Wrp that these are sex worker is not special personal data. Also the College of Protection personal data did not include this in his advice on the bill in 2009. as such. I think that's a narrow view because the effect of this data can be certain; as the Council of State will indicate later. But also already in Opinion Nº 4/2007pdf 'On the concept of personal data - WP 136' of the Article 29 Working Party already referred to the effect that information can have.
In this case, the ECtHR held that professional activities are also covered by the notion of private life from Article 8 of the Convention for the Protection of the Rights of the man and fundamental freedoms fall. Registration as a prostitute is a invasion of private life, as this term could damage her reputation and can cause problems in her daily life. Furthermore, the realization history of the Wbp that sexual life is not the same as a sexual orientation. According to the minister, sexual life also includes promiscuity and whether people regularly go to the Red Light District (Room documents II, 1998/99, 25 892, No 8, p. 23).
The concept of 'personal data' thus includes professional activities. There is no reason to believe that this would be different in the case of special categories of personal data. Therefore, the District Court rightly considered that the professional sexual life of sex workers must also be regarded as special personal data in the sense of Section 16 of the Wbp. This will not be different under the GDPR.