Applying for or cancelling a non-disclosure for personal safety reasons

The non-disclosure only applies to the Population Information System and the Transport Register maintained by Traficom. It does not extend to personal data filing systems containing address information kept by other officials or organisations, such as the trade register maintained by the Finnish Patent and Registration Office. In other words, your information can be viewed there in spite of the non-disclosure.

We can register it for you if you have a justified and evident reason to suspect that the health or safety of yourself or your family is threatened. Such situations include for example domestic violence or working in a profession where you are faced with a threat of serious physical violence.

When we register a non-disclosure for the first time, it will be valid for a maximum of five years. You may then request it to be extended for two more years at a time. If you are applying for a continuation of the non-disclosure, justify your application as carefully as you would for the first time.

A non-disclosure for personal safety reasons may be valid until further notice for a special reason only.

The non-disclosure for personal safety reasons has at least following effects:

Many authorities and businesses do not have access to your home and address information

After the non-disclosure for personal safety reasons has been entered, several authorities will not receive your address information through systems to which the information is updated from the Population Information System. This can make it considerably more difficult to use services such as health centres, child welfare clinics and schools. 

You also do not receive invitations to mass inspections; you must apply for them yourself. 

In addition, address information is not passed on from the population data system to companies, which might make it considerably more difficult to secure a loan or financing, to subscribe to a telephone service, or to make on-line contracts. 

The Suomi.fi e-Authorizations you have granted expire

All Suomi.fi e-Authorizations you have granted will automatically expire when 

• you are granted a non-disclosure for personal safety reasons 
• the validity of the non-disclosure for personal safety reasons is extended. 

If you wish to continue using the e-Authorizations, please re-enter them at www.suomi.fi/e-authorizations.

A child's or guardian's non-disclosure order affects acting on behalf of the child in My Kanta 

The guardian cannot view their child's health information in My Kanta if the child has a non-disclosure order. Guardians who have a non-disclosure order may to authorise each other to act on behalf of the child. 

More information is available at https://www.kanta.fi/en/acting-on-behalf-of-a-minor 

You can remove your non-disclosure immediately on the personal data page of the Suomi.fi Web Service. 

If you cannot remove the non-disclosure electronically, you can visit our service location in person or request that the non-disclosure be removed by e-mail or letter. Please note that in this case, it will take longer to remove the non-disclosure.

A minor cannot remove their own non-disclosure. Their guardians must ask for the non-disclosure to be removed on their behalf. 

Both guardians must request the removal of the non-disclosure using the online form.

If you cannot remove the non-disclosure electronically, you can visit our service location in person or request that the non-disclosure be removed by e-mail or letter. Please note that in this case, it will take longer to remove the non-disclosure.

We will process applications for non-disclosure for personal safety reasons without delay.

It will take longer if we have to request additional information from you. For this reason, it is important that you justify your application well and attach to it the documents proving a threat. 

A non-disclosure for personal safety reasons is used to hide the entry concerning the person's address and municipality of residence in the Population Information System used by the authorities. It prevents these details from being disclosed to private parties that would otherwise have access to them. As a result, the entry concerning the municipality of residence and the address cannot be seen, for example, in the systems of hospitals, cities, banks and insurance companies. This will naturally cause situations in which certain services cannot be provided as quickly and flexibly as normally. In some cases, you cannot use the service at all.

The non-disclosure registration only applies to the Population Information System and the Transport Register maintained by Traficom. It will not prevent your address from appearing in other registers. At least your phone operator and the postal services must be notified of a secret address.

If your address does not change after a non-disclosure for personal safety has been granted, your address details may remain in the registers of different companies. In other words, they will not be automatically removed from other registers.

After you have been granted a non-disclosure for personal safety reasons, you should consider carefully whether you want to disclose your address details.

Even if you have been granted a non-disclosure for personal safety reasons, the authorities have the right to obtain your address details for carrying out statutory duties.

We cannot forward your mail to you.

If we have registered a non-disclosure for you in the Population Information System, we can also register a contact address for you. In this case, the contact address is your public address in the Population Information System, and it may be disclosed to anyone asking for the address details for an acceptable purpose. Therefore, the contact address must not reveal information about your residence. In other words, it cannot be your home address.

You may register your contact address using the online form.

At the fastest, a non-disclosure for personal safety reasons is removed within a few days from when the details of the non-disclosure are removed from the Population Information System. However, this varies and sometimes the notification left from the non-disclosure may affect your use of services even years later. 

First, find out whether you specifically need the old decision or an extract from the Population Information System, which shows both your home address and the fact that you have had a non-disclosure for personal safety reasons.

Click here for instructions to order it from our website, if an extract from the Population Information System is enough.

If you need a copy of the old decision, you can order it from us by e-mail. Give us your name, your date of birth and information on where and when you were granted a non-disclosure for personal safety reasons. Please note that the copy may be subject to a fee.

Check that you have valid prohibitions subject to notification in the Population Information System. You can enable and remove prohibitions in the Check your personal data service. If prohibitions subject to notification are not enough because your safety is threatened, you may apply for a non-disclosure for personal safety reasons.