Protection Authority and having heard the opinion of the Unified Conference (Conferenza Unificata) under art. 8 of Legislative Decree n. 281 of 28 August 1997, shall adopt the operational guidelines. Art. 5-ter (Access to data on statistical units for scientific purposes) 1. The entities and offices of the Italian National Statistical System pursuant to Legislative Decree n. 322 of 6 September 1989, hereinafter referred to as, "Sistan", may grant access for scientific purposes to data on statistical units, arranged in such a way as to make it impossible for them to be directly identified, provided that: a) the access is requested by researchers belonging to universities, research entities, public and private institutions or their research centres, included in the list prepared by the Statistical Office of the European Union (Eurostat) or meeting the requirements set out pursuant to paragraph 3, letter a), further to an assessment conducted by the same subject of Sistan that will grant the access and approved by the Committee under the same paragraph 3; b) a non-disclosure agreement is undersigned by a subject authorized to represent the applicant specifying the conditions of use of the data on statistical units, the obligations of the researchers, the measures envisaged should the obligations assumed be breached, as well as the measures adopted to protect the confidentiality of the data; c) a research proposal is submitted and found to be appropriate on the basis of the criteria set out at paragraph 3, letter b), by the same subject of Sistan that will grant the access. The project shall specify the purpose of the research, the reason for which such purpose cannot be pursued without the use of the data on the statistical items, the name of the researchers who will access the data on the statistical items, the data required, the methods of the research and which results are expected to be disseminated. As many confidentiality statements as are the researchers who will access the data on the statistical items, shall be attached, duly signed by the researchers, to the proposal. It is forbidden to process such data for purposes other than the ones provided for in the research project, to store them for a period exceeding the duration of the project, to disclose the data to third parties and to disseminate them: failure to comply with the foregoing shall result in the imposition of the sanction envisaged by art. 162, paragraph 2-bis, of Legislative Decree n. 196 of 30 June 2003. 2. The data on the statistical units under paragraph 1, given their nature as well as the risks and consequences that may result from their unlawful disclosure, shall be made available to the researchers in the form of a file to which methods of controls have been applied in order to prevent the identification of the statistical unit. In case of reasoned requests, from which it emerges the necessity to know the data for the purposes of the research and the impossibility to find alternative solutions, the files made available shall consist of files to which such methods have not been applied, provided that such files are used in the laboratories set up by the controller of the statistical processing to which the data refer. The files shall be accessible also by remote through laboratories organized and managed by a subject deemed suitable and provided that: the release of the results of the relevant processing is authorized by the person responsible for the same laboratory; the results of the research make it impossible to identify the statistical units, in compliance with the legislation applicable to statistical secrecy and personal data protection, and, should the files be used within the scope of joint projects aimed, among other things, at pursuing institutional tasks of the controller of the statistical processing to which the data refer, on the basis of specific protocols of research undersigned by the researchers involved in the project, in which the rules applicable to statistical secrecy and personal data protection are recalled.