Three months ago, going almost completely unnoticed by the general public (who were understandably more concerned about the war in Ukraine during Biden’s visit to Europe), Biden announced that the European Commission and the United States have agreed in principle on a new Trans-Atlantic Data Privacy Framework.https://laklas.com/data-privacy-we-are-one-step-closer-to-getting-privacy-standards-in-order-between-the-eu-and-us/?preview=true
How will the US and EU handle the data flow between the two jurisdictions?
Europeans are concerned about US privacy policies, with US tech giants storing European user data on their servers in the US. Both the “Save harbor act” and “privacy shield” were recently invalidated by the European court of justice (CJEU) since it was found that they both do not ensure a level of protection that is essentially equivalent to that guaranteed by the current GDPR policy.
The critical issue: In theory, and without a legal framework, every data store in the US is currently illegal by EU standards:
So what happens when European data is transferred to US-based servers?
Which jurisdictions decide what I, as a consumer, can do with my data? Google, Netflix, etc., store their data in America. Data is then governed by US law. Also, any service with US servers and without any entity in the EU would be illegal.
What will change with the new framework?
- Companies and tools like Google Analytics, Microsoft, etc.
- Compliance issues: Small businesses will need to navigate this world and pay attention to learn how the regulation will affect them.
- Legal certainty: new regulations may loom on the horizon.
We still do not know what these changes will fully look like yet, but one thing is for sure: Europe loves regulations.
If you are based in the US, closely monitor any upcoming changes to this policy or work with a local agent who can help you make sense of it all.
For further reading on what will the new agreement will include, see the following link:
