May An Employee Request Biometric Data?

Poland's Supreme Administrative Court (SAC) has recently ruled that an employer is not entitled to collect employees' biometric data in the form of fingerprints in order to record employees' entrance and exits times, even if the employees consent.

Facts of the case

In company X, employees' entrance and exit times were recorded using an IT system. Employees could select one of two time recording methods: fingerprints or entrance cards. Most employees chose fingerprints. They consented to having their fingerprints taken, which the employer did. The IT system automatically identified certain fingerprint features and processed them to a binary code. The employees' first and last names were then assigned to the code and processed in a Microsoft Access database. Working time details were then transferred to working time record cards on paper.