The site, ettevaatust.ee (English: "Watch out"), only launched recently and is the brainchild of a noted influencer in Estonia; within hours of going live, it had attracted controversy, mainly over data protection issues.

AKI public relations adviser Maire Iro said the agency has been receiving "quite a large number" of complaints and other inquiries since the site, operated by content creator and reality TV star Mallukas, real name Mallu Mariann Treimann-Legrant, launched.

Delfi's sister publication Eesti Ekspress noted Mallukas and her husband, Tomas Legrant, had set up the page.

Mallukas said the intention is to make already public information even more accessible, to allow people to vet those who they might have dealings with. The site enables users to add information and court decisions on individuals who have been convicted of committing crimes of a sexual or violent nature, together with that individual's name and image.

Mallukas noted she had considered data protection issues when creating the website, adding that even if its operations do conflict with the regulations, "I don't care," calling the page "highly necessary."

The site aggregates court decisions made public, usually via the State Gazette (Riigi Teataja), and renders them into what the creators say is a more accessible format.

Iro said the site conflicts with data protection rules and that her authority will be contacting the website operator "to clarify these circumstances and will initiate supervisory proceedings," citing issues as being the transparency of data processing, mainly on what basis and to what end the data is published, who the data controller is, and how people's privacy rights are upheld – all conditions which "must be thought through in advance and made clearly and understandably accessible."

Iro stressed that the website operator is also responsible for the accuracy of the published data regardless of where it came from, and to "ensure that sensitive information related to victims is not accidentally disclosed."

"The fact that the data was previously public does not automatically grant the right to publish it again elsewhere," Iro noted – the requirements listed above and compliance with data protection requirements still fully apply.

Any person who has questions or objections relating to the publication of their personal data should in the first instance contact the data controller, i.e. the website operator. "Such requests must be answered without delay, but no later than within one month," Iro added.

Minister of Justice Liisa Pakosta (Eesti 200) has argued that Estonia already has a well-functioning, state-run public criminal records system which balances transparency with legal safeguards. People are welcome to access conviction data (including serious sexual offenses, which she said have no expiry date), Pakosta said, though only via regulated processes, which would include: an authenticated login, the stated aim of the purpose of access, and the payment of a fee, usually notional, to ensure accuracy, prevent misuse, and protect individuals from being wrongly identified.

Pakosta said that child safety is already systematically enforced: anyone working with children must be vetted in advance and rechecked regularly, with strict penalties (up to €32,000) for non-compliance. This system, she suggested, is far more reliable than more ad hoc methods, and ensures both protection of children and fairness to individuals under the rule of law.

The minister strongly counseled against unofficial, crowd-sourced vigilante-style "exposure" lists, arguing they can lead to false accusations and irreversible harm to innocent people.

The AKI has yet to rule on the website.

Eesti Ekspress reported the site was created by Mallukas and her husband, who manages the technical side.

Mallukas said she had received a surge of emails related to pedophilia cases, and while the site is brand new, interest has already been described as "high."

Within the first 24 hours of operation, the site had received 370 submitted names for review, which would entail careful checking, for instance that two or more people with the same or similar names were not confused with each other.
Several individuals have reportedly changed their social media names and profile pictures in the wake of the site going online.

The site is now hosted on a server outside Estonia, Eesti Ekspress reported.

The creators say they fully reject the concept of a "right to be forgotten" principle, in the case of pedophilia at least, stating "science says they don't change."

Treimann-Legrant: pedophile registry should be run by the state

Treimann-Legrant told ERR later on Friday that she was motivated to create the website because "people need it."

"When people have been writing to me for years about their terrible experiences with certain individuals who may have been punished but continue to live happily, or worse, continue their behavior without anyone else knowing about their crimes and quickly find new victims, then at some point I really started to wonder why such a registry doesn't exist. I still don't really have an answer to that, because it seems to me that if the law prevents it, then that law is wrong," Treimann-Legrant said.

"This brings me back to the point that the state should actually be managing this. A state that would have the ability to assign hundreds of people to review this information one by one. Inevitably, mistakes can always happen, which is why we have an email address where people can report if there is an error somewhere. We correct it immediately," Treimann-Legrant said.

Treimann-Legrant emphasized that the website's purpose is not to cause difficulties for people with the same name. "If someone finds a namesake there and it's unclear whether it's them or someone else — for example, if there's no photo—then they can absolutely let us know and we will fix it right away. At the moment, however, we are just a handful of volunteers, and we all do this alongside our jobs, children, and families," she said.

According to Treimann-Legrant, this is not a temporary project. "It's a very strange assumption that I would create such a site and then say I'll shut it down on May 3. No. As long as there are pedophiles who can walk around freely, this site will exist. No one can really shut it down, because there are always ways," she added.

Treimann-Legrant said no agency or institution has asked her to close the website down as yet. "No one has directly contacted us. A few people have reached out to say there was some incorrect information—for example, someone added the wrong photo, because volunteers sometimes don't check thoroughly enough. So far there have only been a few isolated cases, and we simply correct them."

Treimann-Legrant: I've had death threats over the site

The content creator was also highly critical of Pakosta's comments on the site.

"I listened to and watched Ms. Pakosta's remarks, and it seems to me that she may never have used the internet in her life. Seriously, I think her level of internet knowledge is around that of [long running online directory] neti.ee, as what she says is very confusing and unclear," Treimann-Legrant said.

Treimann-Legrant added that creating the website has brought her not only praise but also death threats. "I joked just yesterday that I've never received so many death threats and so much praise all at once. Unfortunately, there are people who really don't like being on that site — and probably for a reason," Treimann-Legrant continued.

Treimann-Legrant aka Mallukas said she does not report the threats to the police. "They (ie. the posters – ed.) don't write under their real names. They create some random Facebook or Instagram account and send them. I just delete them. I have better things to do than argue with idiots. I still stand by my opinion: if people don't like the site because it may harm individuals who are not involved, then I 100 percent agree — come and help us make it better. Give us advice and information. But if someone doesn't like it because they themselves or their good friend is on the site, then their opinion doesn't interest me at all," she concluded.

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