Professional secrecy

The Act on Activities of Attorneys provides that an attorney-at-law (ügyvéd) is bound by professional secrecy with regards to all facts, information and data obtained in the course of carrying out activities of an attorney, irrespective of the nature of such facts, information and data. Professional secrecy provides protection irrespective of the type of the attorney's activities during which the facts, information or data is obtained.

The professional secrecy obligations cover the members and employees of the law firm. An attorney is bound by this obligation even after ceasing activities of an attorney. Professional secrecy covers all documents prepared by an attorney and all other documents in the attorney's possession that contain any facts or data subject to confidentiality.

Violating the obligation pertaining to professional secrecy could result in sanctions ordered by courts independent of attributability under the Civil Code. Such sanctions include declaratory findings, cease and desist orders, appropriate restitution, in integrum restitutio, unjust enrichment claims and grievance payments.

In the course of an on-site inspection, the attorney is entitled and obliged to refuse to provide documents and data covered by professional secrecy, unless the right holder (usually the client) waives the secrecy obligation. An attorney is also entitled and obliged to refuse to testify as a witness in relation to such documents and data, again unless a waiver is given. A waiver may not be validly given in relation to information obtained as a criminal defense attorney.

However, professional secrecy does block authorities from obtaining and using information covered by professional secrecy. Specifically, while an attorney is obliged to refuse to provide information or documents to an authority during a revision, inspection or on-site search, they may not hinder the authority's procedure with reference to professional secrecy, and documents obtained by the authorities may be used as evidence.

Legal professional privilege

The Act on Activities of Attorneys affords additional protection to documents or parts thereof created in the course of communications between the client and the attorney relating to the defense of the client in public authority proceedings, or as a record of the contents of such communications, as long as its privileged nature is apparent from the document itself and the document is held either by the client or the attorney.

Such documents may not be used as evidence in public authority proceedings, and the authorities may not access, seize or copy these documents. Furthermore, the attorney may refuse to grant access to these documents.

The Competition Act and the Medicine Supply Act provide for legal privilege in proceedings of the Hungarian Competition Authority and the National Institute of Pharmacy and Nutrition.

In competition law cases, it has been confirmed by the Supreme Court (Kúria) that legal privilege is not limited to documents that relate to the subject-matter of an investigation or documents that were created after the start of an investigation. The current practice of Hungarian courts follows the principles set by the Court of Justice of the European Union in the Akzo case. It remains to be seen if courts will apply this judicial practice in other type of cases.