The Council of the European Union published a new draft of the ePrivacy Regulation (link here) for discussion purposes on 22 March. This draft aims to facilitate discussions as we are moving towards the final version of the ePrivacy Regulation. As such, the changes outlined below are not final, but rather indicative of the direction that the ePrivacy Regulation is taking. Of particular interest to companies are the provisions relating to cookie settings, and direct marketing communications:
Cookie Settings
The new draft clarifies that a one-off consent for a cookie in the context [...] Read more
On February 16, 2018, the Brussels Court of First Instance rendered a judgment in proceedings brought by the Belgian Privacy Commission’s against Facebook. The case forms one part of two-tiered litigation brought by the Commission in regards to alleged monitoring practices vis-à-vis Belgian internet users. In parallel to the proceedings that resulted in the judgment cited above, the Belgian Privacy Commission had also initiated a procedure referred to as “summary proceedings” against Facebook – and Facebook defeated the Privacy Commission’s claim before the Brussels Court of Appeal in [...] Read more
In just under 100 days, the EU General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) enters into force. One of the major changes the GDPR introduces is a duty for in-scope controllers and processors to maintain written records of their processing activities. Under Article 30 GDPR, companies will need to inventory all “processing activities under [their] responsibility” and memorialize them in a written record setting forth, inter alia, the purposes of processing operations, international transfers, and retention periods.
Article 30 GDPR thus creates a new kind of documentation obligation. This obligation [...] Read more
In less than 100 days, the General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) will go into effect. This means that as of May 25, 2018, each national Supervisory Authority will have the authority to apply and enforce the GDPR.
The GDPR raises the bar in terms of requirements substantially higher than the Data Protection Framework Directive. For instance, it recognizes new rights for data subjects (e.g. right to be forgotten and right to data portability), introduces data breach notification requirements, introduces the concept of a Data Protection Officer, and brings enhanced accountability obligations.
Given [...] Read more
“To Harmonize or Not To Harmonize: That Is the Question.” With the the GDPR fast approaching on May 25, 2018, European Member States are getting ready with the implementation of national legislation. Although the GDPR is a regulation, and directly applicable in all Member States, it has left room for country-specific legislation in several different regards (such as the processing of employee data or individual rights restrictions). Most Member States still only have draft legislation at this point, but the expectation (or at least intention) is that each country will have adopted legislation [...] Read more
In late 2015, the European Court of Justice (ECJ) issued its initial Schrems decision, invalidating the EU/US Safe Harbor and leading to important developments in the rules for transferring personal data from the EU to the US. Since that decision, Mr. Schrems has pursued two further legal proceedings in the EU.
The first involves Mr. Schrems’ challenge in the Irish courts to EU Standard Contractual Clauses, which permit data to be transferred internationally between contract parties. In the trial, Alston & Bird Special Counsel Peter Swire testified as an expert on US national [...] Read more
About this time last January, the European Parliament released its proposal for a new ePrivacy Regulation. The intent of the ePrivacy Regulation is to replace the current ePrivacy regime – which consists of an ePrivacy Directive and a patchwork of local implementing legislation – with a uniform set of directly-applicable EU-wide rules. Since the Parliament released its ePrivacy Regulation draft, both the European Council and the European Parliament have reviewed it and released their own revised drafts.
The ePrivacy Regulation contains a number of important rules for companies. Traditionally, [...] Read more
On November 16, 2017 the Belgian Senate adopted an “Act on the Establishment of the Data Protection Authority” (the “Act”). Following Austria, Germany, and the UK, Belgium is the fourth EU Member State to pass a domestic statute implementing the General Data Protection Regulation 2016/679 (“GDPR”) prior to its effective date of 25 May 2018. The new Belgian Act sets forth the structure and legal organization of the Data Protection Authority (“DPA”), which will serve as the successor of the current Belgian Privacy Commission. More importantly, the Act significantly broadens the DPA’s [...] Read more
On October 18, 2017, the Article 29 Working Party (the “WP29”) published Guidelines clarifying the new profiling and automated decision-making provisions of the General Data Protection Regulation (“GDPR”). European Union regulatory authorities and the WP29 consider that technological developments that facilitate the creation of individual profiles, such as big data analytics, AI and machine learning, have created new risks to data protection. As the majority of industries (insurance, marketing and finance, and even healthcare) already apply and use these new techniques today, the WP29 [...] Read more
In what it considered “an unusual case” (available here), the Irish High Court has referred the issue of the way data is transferred between the EU and countries outside the EU to the Court of Justice of the European Union (“CJEU”). Ms. Justice Caroline Costello will ask the CJEU for a preliminary ruling on the validity of the Standard Contractual Clauses (“SCCs”) as an adequate data transfer mechanism. Justice Costello did not comment on the laws of the EU or the US, but rather on the validity of SCCs as a data transfer measure between the EU and the US.
The case arose from a complaint [...] Read more
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