In a response to the court decision, Schrems said the case was a victory for privacy rights and a blow to surveillance efforts.
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Timmermans said the court’s ruling is “an important step towards upholding Europeans’ fundamental rights to data protection” while Jourová said it gave the Commission a better potential for continuing negotiations on a “safer Safe Harbor” agreement with USA authorities. The US and the European Union will continue working to reach an updated data sharing agreement. By Chris CookeGiven how much the music industry has been banging on about safe harbours of late, you might have thought there’d been a big development yesterday with the news that the European courts had passed a ruling declaring a safe harbour deal invalid.
U.S. Secretary of Commerce Penny Pritzker said she would work with the European Commission to reform the Safe Harbor agreement.
The ruling invalidates a pact that had allowed thousands of companies to transfer data on European users to the US – information such as when someone clicks “like” on Facebook or an advertisement link. Binding Corporate Rules (BCRs) are created to allow companies to transfer personal data from the European Economic Area (EEA) outside of the EEA in compliance with the 8th data protection principle and Article 25 of Directive 95/46/EC. He said that on foot of the judgement and the strategic partnership which exists between the European Union and the USA, it was necessary to find a “new process”.
Max Schrems started the litigation because he considered that Facebook did not guarantee sufficient protection for the personal data it was transferring to the United States.
The decision doesn’t mean companies must immediately stop transferring data to the U.S.
But Schrems had argued that the 15-year-old Safe Harbour deal is too weak to guarantee the privacy of European residents in the wake of details provided by former US National Security Agency (NSA) contractor and whistleblower Snowden.
Microsoft has announced its stance on the ruling via its blog post stating, “For Microsoft’s enterprise cloud customers, we believe the clear answer is that yes they can continue to transfer data by relying on additional steps and legal safeguards we have put in place”.
A few 4,500 companies have always been able to store users’ personal data – everything from status updates and photos to personal information like bank details and home addresses – where they see fit, often in the U.S.
Joanne Bone, partner at national law firm Irwin Mitchell, said: “This decision opens up a huge can of worms for businesses which trade with the United States or even those who just have cloud solutions with United States providers”.
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In an interview with the BBC broadcast Monday, Snowden said he was ready to go to prison if US authorities would accept a plea bargain. The core issue is: “do online companies have to stick to the rules or do they live somewhere in the “Wild West” where they can do whatever they want to do?”
