Schrems v Facebook: European Court Strikes Down EU-US Privacy Shield Agreement

JUL 16, 2020 | US | EUROPEAN UNION

Computer Weekly, July 16, 2020

By Bill Goodwin

Europe’s highest court today struck out the EU-US Privacy Shield agreement, overturning the legal basis that allows more than half a million US companies to exchange data with Europe.

The court upheld the validity of another legal mechanism, standard contractual clauses (SCCs), which allow European companies to legally share data with the US and other countries – but added caveats to their use.

SCCs are used to transfer data from the EU to some 180 countries, including Australia, Singapore, South Korea, Brazil, India and Mexico, according to the Business Software Alliance (BSA).

“Today’s Privacy Shield decision just removed from the table one of the few, and most trusted, ways to transfer data across the Atlantic,” said Thomas Boué, director general of the BSA.

“The impacts will be felt by large and small enterprises on both side of the Atlantic, when businesses are focused on recovering from the economic impacts of Covid-19 and are increasingly relying on data-driven tools and services to do so,” he said.

BSA 소개

소프트웨어 연합(BSA | The Software Alliance, 이하 BSA)(www.bsa.org)은 각국 정부를 대상으로 세계 시장에서 전 세계 소프트웨어 업계를 대변하고 옹호하는 선도적 연합체입니다. 세계의 가장 혁신적 기업들이 회원사로 참여하며 경제에 활기를 불어 넣고 현대의 생활을 향상시키는 소프트웨어 솔루션을 만들어 내고 있습니다.

워싱턴 DC에 본부를 두고, 30개국이 넘는 국가들에서 운영되는 BSA는, 합법적 소프트웨어 사용을 증진시키고 기술 혁신을 촉진하며 디지털 경제의 성장을 추진하는 공공 정책을 지지하는 준법 프로그램들을 선도합니다.