Register of beneficial owners publicly inaccessible from 17 December 2025

The Ministry of Justice has announced that from 17 December 2025, it will make the Register of Beneficial Owners (in Czech: Evidence skutečných majitelů, ESM) publicly inaccessible. This step follows current European legislation and recent case law of the supreme courts. 

Until now, the ESM has been largely freely accessible, and anyone could search for basic information about the beneficial owners of legal entities and legal arrangements. However, in their recent decisions, the Supreme Court and the Supreme Administrative Court have described this situation as a disproportionate infringement on the right to privacy and personal data protection. This conclusion follows on from a ruling by the Court of Justice of the European Union, which repealed part of the EU directive requiring public access to data on beneficial owners. 

As, in light of the case law of the supreme courts, the obligation to register with the ESM leads to an unjustified infringement on fundamental rights, the state cannot insist on its fulfilment and therefore cannot sanction its violation. In practice, therefore, key instruments and sanction mechanisms of the ESM Act have ceased to be applied – for example, irregularities and offences are not dealt with, and private law sanctions (prohibition of payment of profit shares or shares in liquidation balance, or prohibition of the exercise of voting rights) are not applied. Entities have thus lost the motivation to keep data complete, accurate and up to date, which has led to limited use of the ESM. 
 

What will change? 

After 17 December 2025, the public will no longer be able to view any data on beneficial owners in the ESM. Access will remain available to public authorities, entities subject to the AML Act (banks, solicitors, notaries, auditors, tax advisers) and other privileged entities, such as certain entities awarding public contracts. The ministry is preparing a new automated system that will allow most of these entities to set up remote access. In addition, limited access will also be granted to persons who demonstrate a legitimate interest. 

Making the data inaccessible to the public is intended to remedy the unconstitutionality of the current situation. Once again, all processes linked to the ESM will thus begin to apply, the registration obligation will be enforced, proceedings on irregularities can be initiated and private law sanctions reactivated. Legal entities that have so far relied on the ESM’s being ‘paralysed’ should therefore supplement, correct or update their data as soon as possible, but no later than 17 December 2025. 
 

Further legislative developments

The Ministry of Justice is currently preparing an amendment to the ESM Act, which will formally establish the inaccessibility of the register to the public and at the same time implement new EU AML legislation rules, according to which data on beneficial owners will no longer be publicly available.