It follows from the Danish Preparedness Act that the individual ministers are responsible for planning with a view to maintaining the activities of society in an emergency situation (such as accidents, disasters and acts of war).

The ministers are to provide the necessary legislation and the requisite planning basis. The area to be handled by the Minister for Science, Technology and Innovation is defined in current telecommunications legislation. One of the areas under the Minister's responsibility is to ensure the availability of telecommunications to society.

In the Executive Order on Emergency Preparedness in the Telecommunications Sector, powers in this area have been delegated, to a wide extent, to the National IT and Telecom Agency. The Agency may lay down detailed rules on emergency planning in the IT and telecommunications sector, including physical protection of infrastructure and restrictions on traffic for parties other than selected users.

In addition, the Agency is charged with the task of coordinating and prioritising the varying demands of the emergency authorities for vital electronic communications in an emergency situation.

The National IT and Telecom Agency is responsible for:

• Receiving and coordinating requirements from emergency authorities for leased lines for emergency purposes. 
• Determining which of the connections operated by the telecommunications providers should be covered by the transmission facilities of the telecommunications networks when these cannot satisfy all demands.
• Giving orders to telecommunications providers to set priorities for restoring destroyed installations.
• Imposing a duty on telecommunications providers to limit their overall traffic load on telecommunications networks and services.

The National IT and Telecom Agency is the supervisory authority and maintains supervision to ensure that telecommunications providers are planning and implementing the precautionary measures required under current telecommunications legislation.

National emergency planning

The National IT and Telecom Agency is cooperating with telecommunications providers and a number of national emergency management authorities on the planning of modern and efficient emergency management in the IT and telecommunications sector. A special collaborative project has been established with the Danish Energy Agency and other key stakeholders in the energy sector. Furthermore, the National IT and Telecom Agency participates in international collaboration on IT and telecommunications emergency planning and protection of critical infrastructure, particularly within the framework of NATO and EU.

In 2007 a major development effort was started in relation to specifying requirements for emergency planning by telecommunications providers and for a robust electronic infrastructure, so as to ensure risk-controlled emergency planning and regular vulnerability assessments in the area. The National IT and Telecom Agency will also reconsider the possibility of an extended scheme offering priorities in the networks to selected users.

Link to relevant translated law material