45The obligation of professional secrecy extends beyond business secrets to information which is known to only a limited number of persons and the disclosure of which is liable to cause serious harm to the person who has provided it or to third parties. Last, the interests liable to be harmed by disclosure of the information concerned must, objectively, be worthy of protection. The assessment of the confidentiality of a piece of information thus requires the legitimate interests which oppose disclosure of the information to be weighed against the public interest that the activities of the EU institutions take place as openly as possible (see, to that effect, judgment of 30 May 2006 in Bank Austria Creditanstalt v Commission, T‑198/03, ECR, EU:T:2006:136, paragraphs 29 and 71).
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