According to Art. 12 of Law No. 30, the transfer of personal data out of Bahrain is prohibited unless the transfer is made to a country or region that provides sufficient protection to personal data. Alternatively, data controllers can also transfer personal data to countries that are not determined to have sufficient protection of personal data under several circumstances, including a permission to be issued by the Authority on a case-by-case basis, the consent of the data subject and the necessity to conclude a contract (Art. 13).
Order No. 42 establishes a list of countries that have been deemed by the Authority to provide an adequate level of data protection. The adequacy list includes 83 countries, including the UAE, Saudi Arabia, Oman, Jordan, Kuwait, Egypt, India, all EU countries, UK, and USA. Controllers may transfer personal data to any country on the adequacy list without needing to obtain any authorisation from the Authority (Art. 2).

Art. 2 of Order No. 45 provides that sensitive personal data should not be processed without the consent of the data subject, unless one of the cases of Art. 5 of Law No. 30 applies. These include:
- The processing is required by the data controllers for their duties and the exercise of their legally prescribed rights in the field of labour relations that binds them to their employees;
- The processing is necessary to protect any person if the data subject, their custodian, guardian, or trustee is not legally able to give their consent, and is subject to obtaining prior permission from the Authority;
- The processed data was provided by the data subject to the public;
- The processing is necessary to initiate or defend any legal rights claim, including what is required in preparation for the matter;
- The processing is necessary for the purposes of preventive medicine, medical diagnosis, provisions of health care, treatment, or management of health care services by a licensed medical practitioner or any person legally bound to maintain confidentiality.
Controllers also have to implement additional organisational rules when processing sensitive personal data including appropriate high-level technical measures to ensure a high degree of protection against secrecy, breach or unlawful processing of such data (Art. 4 of Order No. 45).
Processing is broadly defined in Art. 1 of Law No. 30 and includes disclosing by transmission, dissemination, transference or otherwise making available for others.

Bahrain has not joined any agreement with binding commitments to open transfers of data across borders.

According to Art. 59 of the Central Bank of Bahrain and Financial Institutions Law of 2006, a licensee must keep accounting records, other records that may be specified by the Central Bank and separate records for each branch abroad providing any of the services that are subject to the law. Insurance and reinsurance companies must keep records as may be specified by the Central Bank, including insurance contracts signed by the company, claims made against it and actions taken thereon, reinsurance contracts entered into by the company, and funds to be maintained according to the law (Art. 59). Moreover, Art. 60 states that the period for which the companies must keep the data is at least ten years and the documents have to be retained at the licensee's main office in Bahrain, or at such other places as the Central Bank may approve.

It is reported that the Telecommunications Regulatory Authority (TRA), the executive authority for the supervision and administration of services in the telecommunications sector, is independent from the government in the decision-making process.

Art. 26 of the Legislative Decree No. 48 of 2002 provides that a licensee must be incorporated in Bahrain or have a registered branch office in Bahrain. In addition, it provides that, subject to certain exceptions, substantially all of the infrastructure and personnel associated with the provision of the telecommunications service must be located within Bahrain.

Bahrain has not appended the World Trade Organization (WTO) Telecom Reference Paper to its schedule of commitments.

There is an obligation for passive infrastructure sharing in Bahrain to deliver telecom services to end users. It is practiced in the mobile sector and in the fixed sector based on commercial agreements.

Batelco, the former incumbent telecom operator, underwent a structural separation in 2019 into a wholesale infrastructure unit (BNET) and a retail operator (Batelco). The process for completing the full internal systems and organisational separation is under way, according to Resolution No. 17 Promulgating the Fifth National Telecommunications Plan. The Fifth Telecommunications Plan adopted in 2020 provides that BNET will become the sole fibre network infrastructure company over time. Batelco is partly owned by the government. As reported in 2020, Mumtalakat Holding Company and Social Insurance Organization, both of which are associated with the Bahraini government, own more than 55% of the shares.

While it is reported that Bahrain has established accounting separation by law for the operator with significant market power, functional separation for operators with significant market power is not required by law. Nevertheless, the Resolution No. 17 Promulgating the Fifth National Telecommunications Plan shows that the government is finalising the implementation of the structural separation of Batelco (the former incumbent) into a wholesale infrastructure unit (BNET) and a retail operator (Batelco).

Bahrain has ratified the World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO) Performances and Phonograms Treaty.

Law No. 7 of 2003 provides a framework for effective protection of trade secrets.

Bahrain has a copyright regime under Law No. 22 of 2006 on the Protection of Copyright and Neighbouring Rights. However, the exceptions do not follow the fair use or fair dealing model, therefore limiting the lawful use of copyrighted work by others. Arts. 19-30 list the exceptions, which include uses for non­-profit archives or libraries to make one photocopy of a work without the consent of the author and without paying compensation; make a reproduction from a work to be used in judicial or administrative procedures, within the limits necessary for such procedures and on condition that mention is made of the source, and of the name of the author if it appears in the source; among others.

It is reported that piracy of audio, video and software by end users remains a problem, despite the government implemented a copyright enforcement campaign that included inspections, shutdowns and a better focus on raising public awareness. This campaign, started already in 1997, focused on the video, audio and software industries, achieving significant results. Most commercial markets selling pirated products have been eliminated. It is also reported that the rate of unlicensed software installation in the country was 52% in 2017, for an estimated commercial value of USD 32 million.

Bahrain has ratified the World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO) Copyright Treaty.