Article 6 Political Constitution of the United Mexican States

The manifestation of ideas shall not be the object of any judicial or administrative inquisition, except in the case that it attacks morality, private life or the rights of third parties, provokes some crime, or disturbs public order; the right of reply shall be exercised in the terms provided by the law. The right to information shall be guaranteed by the State.

Every person has the right to free access to plural and timely information, as well as to seek, receive and disseminate information and ideas of all kinds through any means of expression.

The State shall guarantee the right of access to information and communication technologies, as well as to the services of broadcasting and telecommunications, including that of broadband and the Internet. For such purposes, the Federal Executive, through the dependency in charge of preparing and conducting the policies of telecommunications and broadcasting, shall establish conditions of effective competition in the provision of said services.

For the purposes of the provisions of this article, the following shall be observed:

A.For the exercise of the right of access to information, the Federation and the states (federal entities), within the scope of their respective competencies, shall be governed by the following principles and bases:

I.All information in the possession of any authority, entity, organ and body of the Executive, Legislative and Judicial Powers, autonomous organs, political parties, trusts and public funds, as well as of any natural person, legal person or labor union that receives and exercises public resources or performs acts of authority in the federal, state and municipal sphere, is public and may only be temporarily reserved for reasons of public interest and national security, in the terms that the laws set. In the interpretation of this right, the principle of maximum publicity must prevail. The obligated subjects must document every act that derives from the exercise of their faculties, competencies or functions; the law shall determine the specific assumptions under which the declaration of non-existence of the information shall proceed.

II.The information that refers to private life and personal data shall be protected in the terms and with the exceptions that the laws set. For such purpose, the obligated subjects shall have sufficient faculties for its attention.

As regards the information related to personal data in the possession of private individuals, the law to which article 90 of this Constitution refers shall determine the competence to hear the procedures related to their protection, verification and imposition of sanctions.

III.Every person, without the need to accredit any interest or justify its use, shall have free access to public information, to their personal data or to the rectification of these.

IV.Expeditious mechanisms of access to public information and review procedures shall be established, which shall be substantiated before the competent instances in the terms that this Constitution and the laws fix.

V.The obligated subjects must preserve their documents in updated administrative archives and shall publish, through the available electronic means, the complete and updated information on the exercise of public resources and the indicators that allow accounting for the fulfillment of their objectives and of the results obtained.

VI.The laws shall determine the manner in which the obligated subjects must make public the information related to the public resources that they deliver to natural persons or legal persons.

VII.The non-observance of the provisions in matters of access to public information shall be sanctioned in the terms that the laws provide.

VIII.The obligated subjects must promote, respect, protect and guarantee the rights of access to public information and to the protection of personal data. The laws on the matter shall determine the bases, general principles and procedures of the exercise of these rights, as well as the competence of the authorities of internal control and surveillance or homologues in the federal and local sphere to hear the review procedures against the acts that the obligated subjects issue.

The obligated subjects shall be governed by the general law on matters of transparency and access to public information and protection of personal data, in the terms that it is issued by the Congress of the Union to establish the bases, general principles and procedures of the exercise of this right.

The exercise of this right shall be governed by the principles of certainty, legality, independence, impartiality, efficacy, objectivity, professionalism, transparency and maximum publicity.

The law shall establish that information which is considered reserved or confidential.

B.In matters of broadcasting and telecommunications:

I.The State shall guarantee the population its integration into the information and knowledge society, through a policy of universal digital inclusion with annual and six-year goals.

II.Telecommunications are public services of general interest, for which the State shall guarantee that they are provided in conditions of competition, quality, plurality, universal coverage, interconnection, convergence, continuity, free access and without arbitrary interferences.

III.Broadcasting is a public service of general interest, for which the State shall guarantee that it is provided in conditions of competition and quality and brings the benefits of culture to the entire population, preserving the plurality and the veracity of the information, as well as the promotion of the values of national identity, contributing to the purposes established in article 3o. of this Constitution.

IV.The transmission of advertising or propaganda presented as journalistic or news information is prohibited; the conditions that must govern the contents and the contracting of the services for their transmission to the public shall be established, including those related to the responsibility of the concessionaires with respect to the information transmitted on behalf of third parties, without affecting the freedom of expression and of dissemination.

V.The law shall establish a decentralized public body with technical, operational, decision-making and management autonomy, which shall have as its object to provide the broadcasting service without profit, in order to ensure access to the largest number of persons in each one of the entities of the Federation, to contents that promote national integration, educational, cultural and civic formation, equality between women and men, the dissemination of impartial, objective, timely and truthful information on national and international events, and to give space to works of independent production, as well as to the expression of the diversity and plurality of ideas and opinions that strengthen the democratic life of society.

The public body shall have a Citizens' Council (Consejo Ciudadano) for the purpose of ensuring its independence and an impartial and objective editorial policy. It shall be integrated by nine honorary counselors who shall be elected through a broad public consultation by the vote of two thirds of the members present of the Senate or, during its recesses, of the Permanent Commission (Comisión Permanente). The counselors shall perform their commission in a staggered form, for which annually the two with the greatest seniority in the position shall be substituted, unless they were ratified by the Senate for a second period.

The President of the public body shall be designated, at the proposal of the Federal Executive, with the vote of two thirds of the members present of the Senate or, during its recesses, of the Permanent Commission (Comisión Permanente); they shall last in their commission five years, may be designated for a new period only once, and may only be removed by the Senate through the same majority.

The President of the body shall present annually to the Executive and Legislative Powers of the Union a report of activities; for that purpose they shall appear before the Chambers of the Congress in the terms that the laws provide.

VI.The law shall establish the rights of the users of telecommunications, of the audiences, as well as the mechanisms for their protection.