Data & Privacy Archives

This week, Max Schrems, an Austrian lawyer and activist who launched the not-for-profit organisation NYOB, standing for None-of-Your-Business, joins Euractiv Tech brief podcast to talk about the European Union - United States Data Privacy Framework, the new transatlantic agreement allowing …

The British Information Commissioner’s Office (ICO) issued a preliminary enforcement notice against Snapchat last Friday (6 October) due to the social platform possibly failing to assess the privacy risks of “My AI”, its artificial intelligence (AI) bot. My AI is Snapchat’s …

The German competition authority concluded its proceedings against Google's data processing conditions on Thursday (5 October). The US company agreed to give users more control over their data.

'What is illegal offline should be illegal online' has been the EU's guiding concept in regulating the internet. Yet, politicians and experts continue to question whether ending online anonymity is the missing step towards reaching this ideal.

French lawmaker Philippe Latombe's latest lawsuit at the EU's top court, which could derail the new EU-US data transfer deal, has found support in Germany, where the two-month-old agreement is already facing widespread criticism.

With a new text of the EU Data Act unveiled by EU legislators on 27 June, it should be considered whether the legislative proposal will be a catalyst or roadblock to the vision of a “Europe fit for the digital age”, write Francesca Blythe, Lauren Cuyvers, and Matthias Bruynseraede.

Twenty-five of the major car brands fail to uphold consumer privacy through collecting personal data by means of microphones, cameras, and devices connected to cars by users, according to a study by Mozilla, which was quickly challenged by car makers.

US tech giant Apple, which decided to halt the development of a photo-scanning tool to detect child sexual abuse material last December, has now offered data privacy concerns as the main reason behind the decision.

The new National Data Strategy was adopted by the German Federal Cabinet on Wednesday (30 August). The objective is to use the potential of generated data more effectively, to strengthen digital innovation and to improve competitiveness.

Norway's data protection agency said on Tuesday (8 August) it would start fining Facebook and Instagram owner Meta nearly $100,000 per day for defying a ban on using users' personal information to target ads.

Ten Members of the European Parliament asked the European Commission on Wednesday (19 July) for a moratorium on tracking users online, and more details on how it intends to apply the EU's new digital rules in this domain.

The Meta-owned social media platforms will face a temporary three-month ban on behavioural advertising based on extensive user profiling in Norway starting on 4 August, following a ruling of the EU Court of Justice that found the practice lacked a legal basis.

WhatsApp updated its privacy policy by switching to the 'legitimate interest' legal basis following an Irish Data Protection Commissioner's sanction in January.

Bard, Google’s eagerly awaited response to ChatGPT, was launched in Europe on Thursday (13 July), following delays in complying with the EU’s data protection rules.

The European Commission formalised its new adequacy decision for the EU-US Data Privacy Framework on Monday (10 July), providing a new legal framework for transatlantic data flows after the two previous ones were struck down in court.

In a case against Meta, the European Court of Justice backed the competence of national antitrust authorities to identify data protection infringements and suggested consent might be the only legal basis for the company's data processing.

The regulation to fight child sexual abuse material (CSAM) online is unnecessary as there are other regulations for safety on the internet, Paweł Lewandowski, Polish undersecretary of state at the chancellery of the prime minister, told EURACTIV.

The European Commission presented on Tuesday (4 July) a legislative proposal to harmonise certain aspects of national procedural rules to speed up cross-border cases under the General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR). 

EU policymakers reached a political agreement on the Data Act in the late hours of Tuesday (27 June).

The Irish government added a last-minute amendment to a bill allowing the Irish Data Protection Commission (DPC) to label all their procedures as confidential.

The privacy watchdogs of the G7 countries are set to detail a common vision of the data protection challenges of generative AI models like ChatGPT, according to a draft statement seen by EURACTIV.

EU institutions are due to reach a political agreement on the Data Act next week, with ongoing discussions on the issue of trade secrets, governance, territorial scope, product safety and time of application. The Data Act is a flagship legislative proposal …

Civil society groups from across Europe have mobilised to defend the rights of complainants to be full parties in cross-border cases of data privacy violations, amid fears that these might be removed under an upcoming EU legislative proposal.

The French Senate questioned two French senior managers of the successful social network TikTok, who repeatedly admitted that they were unable to answer the questions put to them.