Constituição da República de Cabo Verde, Artigo 45.º (Utilização de meios informáticos e protecção de dados pessoais) e Artigo 48.º (Liberdades de expressão e de informação) (Constitution of the Republic of Cabo Verde, constitutional protection of digital privacy/data and freedom of expression and information)

The Constitution of the Republic of Cabo Verde, originally adopted on 25 September 1992 and most recently consolidated by Constitutional Law No. 1/VII/2010, contains express, digital-specific fundamental-rights guarantees that qualify it for inclusion under Digital Rights. Inclusion-bar justification: unlike a generic free-expression clause, Article 45 ('Utilização de meios informáticos e protecção de dados pessoais', use of informatic means and protection of personal data) addresses computerised data processing in explicit terms, enshrining what is in substance a constitutional right of data protection and habeas data. This digital-specific constitutional language is precisely the kind of provision the inclusion bar is designed to admit, and it gives Cabo Verde's data-protection and digital-privacy framework direct constitutional grounding rather than a purely statutory footing. Article 45 establishes constitutional control over the use of information technology to process personal data: it guarantees individuals rights of access to data held about them, the right to demand correction, updating and, where appropriate, erasure of such data (the habeas data guarantee), and limits the computerised processing and interconnection of sensitive personal data. It is complemented by Article 48 ('Liberdades de expressão e de informação'), which protects freedom of expression and the right to inform and be informed without hindrance or discrimination, guarantees that extend to expression and information disseminated through digital and online means. Cabo Verde is widely regarded as the first African state to enact a comprehensive data-protection framework (Law No. 133/V/2001), and the major statutory protections are mirrored at constitutional level, giving them an additional layer of legitimacy. The constitutional guarantees are operationalised by the data-protection authority, the Comissão Nacional de Protecção de Dados (CNPD), and reinforced by Cabo Verde's accession to Council of Europe Convention 108+. There is no documented history of internet shutdowns or systematic online-content blocking in Cabo Verde, consistent with its standing as a stable democracy with strong civil-liberties protections. This entry records the constitutional layer of Cabo Verde's digital-rights framework and is related to the country's dedicated cybercrime statute (Lei n.º 8/IX/2017, cv-cyber-2017) and read alongside its data-protection law (Lei n.º 133/V/2001). Source language: Portuguese; constitutional article numbering follows the consolidated 2010 text and should be confirmed by a reviewer against the current official consolidation.

1. 1Constitutional instrument (Constitution of 25 September 1992, consolidated by Constitutional Law No. 1/VII/2010) containing express digital-specific guarantees
2. 2Article 45 ('Utilização de meios informáticos e protecção de dados pessoais'): constitutional right to data protection over the computerised processing of personal data
3. 3Habeas data: rights of access, correction, updating and erasure of personal data held about the individual, with limits on the processing and interconnection of sensitive data
4. 4Article 48 ('Liberdades de expressão e de informação'): freedom of expression and the right to inform and be informed, extending to online expression
5. 5Constitutional protections mirror Cabo Verde's statutory data-protection framework (Law No. 133/V/2001), supervised by the CNPD; reinforced by Convention 108+ accession
6. 6No documented internet-shutdown or online-content-blocking practice
7. 7Included under the constitutional inclusion bar on the basis of Article 45's explicit digital/informatics-specific language, not a generic clause